In June 1951, the French Government confiscated the offices of the Delegation of the Basque Government located on Marceau Avenue in Paris, and gave the building to the Franco dictatorship.
This building had been purchased by the Basque Nationalist Party with contributions from the Basque Diaspora after the Basque Government had fled to exile during the Francoist insurrection, and was ceded to the Basque Government for it to set up its headquarters there.
Between 1940 and 1944, during the Nazi occupation of Paris and France, the authorities gave it to their Francoist allies, who used it as a delegation for their machinery of political repression and persecution.
After the liberation of the French capital, it was recovered by the Basque Government in Exile, who again made it their headquarters. Soon after, in June 1951, it was definitively? stolen by the Francoist government with the collusion of the French authorities.
This month marks the 70th anniversary of that plundering and that shame for the French authorities, and for the democratic authorities of the Kingdom of Spain who not only have not returned it, but indeed still use it as one of the headquarters for the Cervantes Institute.
Seventy years of theft and infamy, which has yet to be corrected, and which we’ve blogged about many times.
We can’t just let the 70th anniversary of this injustice go by without remembering it and again highlight the obligation a government that calls itself democratic should feel to return what was stolen.
Spain won’t return what was stolen…but it’ll let a plaque be placed
The Basque Press Office: a “light of democracy” during 31 years of disgrace
Last Updated on Jun 9, 2021 by About Basque Country
