Remembering the Falklands/Malvinas

On this day 30 years ago, Argentina invaded the Falklands Islands. The news is full of this so I want to concentrate on a few memory issues by showing the respective memorials and taking a brief look at media coverage.

The British official commemoration took place at the national memorial arboretum in Staffordshire. I've just seen it for the first time on the BBC news and to be honest I thought it looked a bit sterile, but it does receive 300,000 visitors a year apparently.

"I think it shows an ongoing need for remembrance," said the Royal British Legion spokesman Andrew Baud. "It used to be a place for veterans but now it is very much a place for families."

Falklands widows remember loved ones on war's 30th anniversary (Guardian)


In Argentina, president Cristina Fernandez is at the memorial in Ushuaia:


Cristina Fernandez leads main Malvinas war commemoration in Ushuaia (Mercopress)

As for the Argentine press, they fall into their accustomed roles. La Nacion goes for a very formal image and a nationalistic headlines about the "inflexible kelpers".









Meanwhile Pagina/12 focuses on the personal testimony of former soldiers - and they make tough reading. The desperate story of Silvio Katz, tortured by his anti-semitic superior officer, is just as horrifying as any other experience of the dirty war.








Meanwhile, Clarin squeezes the memory issue onto the bottom right of its cover.










Images: National memorial arboretum by NMAguide on Wikipedia, Malvinas memorial in Ushuaia by Miguel A. Monjas.