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Judi Lynn

(160,211 posts)
Tue Sep 8, 2020, 02:25 PM Sep 2020

Town honors man who saved Italians from Argentine junta

Filippo Di Benedetto forged passports, gave plane fare to 100s

Redazione ANSA
ROME
08 September 2020



RIPRODUZIONE RISERVATA

(ANSA) - ROME, SEP 8 - A Calabrian town has honoured a local man who saved hundreds of Italians from the Argentine junta in the 1970 and 80s.

Filippo Di Benedetto, a Communist union organizer, defied the military regime to forge passports and give plane tickets to Italian targets of the bloody junta that ruled the South American country, leaving thousands of 'disappeared'.

Now his home town of Saracena near Reggio Calabria has named a street after him.

"His story is like that of German businessman Oskar Schindler told in the Steven Spielberg film, Schindler's list, and albeit less known it has the same quality of heroism in helping save many human lives in the years of the dictatorship in Argentina," said the Saracea town council. (ANSA).

https://www.ansa.it/english/news/2020/09/08/town-honors-man-who-saved-italians-from-argentine-junta_e17cec0d-f1a4-4ff4-b383-6361e8b59bde.html



Google translation:

Saracena remembers Filippo Di Benedetto the Calabrian schindler in Argentina

During the years of the dictatorship, the Saracena trade unionist saved hundreds of fellow countrymen from certain death



by Redazione - 07 September 2019 - 9:35

His story is similar to that of the German entrepreneur Oskar Schindler narrated in Steven Spielberg's film, Schindler's list, and although less known, he has the same trait of heroism for having contributed to saving several human lives during the years of the dictatorship in Argentina.

Filippo Di Benedetto, a native of Saracena where in the years between 1947 and 1949 he held the role of mayor of the PCI, will be remembered in a ceremony in the presence of his son Claudio, whom the Municipality of Saracena, led by the Mayor Renzo Russo, intended to organize for Saturday 7 September at 6.00 pm first in Piazza Castello, where a plaque will be affixed in his memory, and then in the council room with a conference, to remember the figure of the trade unionist and champion of human rights, in which Vittorio will take part among others Cappelli, Unical professor, Angelo Sposato, regional secretary of the CGIL, Enrico Calamai, former Italian consul in Argentina, moderated by the journalist Giulia Veltri.

In the early 1950s, Di Benedetto emigrated to Argentina, in Buenos Aires, where he worked as a cabinetmaker but continued, at the same time, to cultivate his greatest passion, politics, soon becoming the official referent of the Italian Communist Party in Argentina. . The union, among the ranks of the Inca CGIL, saw him engaged as head of the patronage and then as president of Filef, the Federation of Emigrant Workers and Families. In the years in which the military took power in Argentina, Di Benedetto had become a leading figure among the Italian emigrants in the country of the gauchos, a very important political and trade union point of reference for thousands of compatriots, who turned to him and his organization for anything,

When the coup junta began to show its ferocity many Italians were also the object of military repression, just think that from 1976 to 1978 more than 1600 complaints were presented to the Italian embassy in Buenos Aires, concerning missing persons with Italian passports.

While in Rome no one did anything about what was happening in Argentina Filippo Di Benedetto had the courage to challenge one of the most violent regimes in history by giving refuge to the hunted, he prepared false passports, provided plane tickets, accompanied many compatriots to the airport to allow him to return home and save yourself from oppression or even death. The vicissitudes of aid to the Italians in Argentina brought Di Benedetto to meet Enrico Calamai, the Italian vice consul in Buenos Aires who will be present at the meeting in Saracena, and Gian Giacomo Foà, a journalist for Corriere della Sera. During his diplomatic activity Calamai, in a discreet manner, saved many people, in some cases taking many risks, accompanying them to the border. In recent history he has also helped convict eight Argentine soldiers by testifying in the trial against them. In 2004 he was awarded the highest Argentine honor, Commander of the Order of the Liberator of San Martin.

https://www.cosenzainforma.it/inprovincia/2019/09/07/saracena-ricorda-filippo-di-benedetto-lo-schindler-calabrese-in-argentina/9636/


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