Italian President Sergio Mattarella
and his German counterpart Frank-Walter Steinmeier on September
29 will be in Marzabotto for the official commemoration of the
80th anniversary of the massacre in the town near Bologna where
the SS carried out their worst WWII atrocity.
A report on the commemoration's organization initially published
by local media was confirmed by the Marzabotto Commettee on
Monday.
The last time an Italian president officially visited the
location of the Nazi massacre with a German head of State dates
back to 2002, organizers said.
The Marzabotto massacre, or more correctly, the massacre of
Monte Sole, was a World War II war crime consisting of the mass
murder of at least 770 civilians by Nazi troops, which took
place in the territory around the small village of Marzabotto,
in the mountainous area south of Bologna.
It was the largest massacre of civilians committed by the Waffen
SS in western Europe during the war.
It is also the deadliest mass shooting in the history of Italy.
In January 2007, 10 of 17 suspected former SS members were found
guilty in absentia by an Italian military tribunal in the north
Italian town of La Spezia.
They were sentenced to life imprisonment for the massacre.
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