"Adolf Hitler was Right" Banner and Swastika Displayed at Madrid Bull Ring: SWC Protests to Spanish Prime Minister

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

"Adolf Hitler was Right" Banner and Swastika Displayed at Madrid Bull Ring: SWC Protests to Spanish Prime Minister

Paris, 21 August 2013

In a letter to Spanish Prime Minister(President of the Government) Mariano Rajoy, the Simon Wiesenthal Centre Director for International Relations, Dr. Shimon Samuels, noted that “foreign tourists attending the ‘corrida’ atthe Madrid Pinto bullring have shared with us their shock to see the arena decorated with a banner emblazoned with the swastika and the profile of Hitler, proclaiming ‘Adolf Hitler TeniaRazon’ (‘Adolf Hitler was right’).”

Samuels declared that “Spain had lost too many of its citizens fighting for or against the swastika in the Civil War, a prelude to World War Two. Moreover,Spanish hospitality waslong abused as a refuge for Nazi criminals in the post-war period.”

The letter reported that, “while the municipality lamented that the banner, mounted the morning before the bullfight, was not removed before it began, it is still featured in photosposted on the municipality’s own website.”

Samuels was amazed that “the ‘corrida’ was not suspended, according to the Mayor, 'for reasons of security' and ‘so that the not guilty (5,000 spectators) remain without a bullfight’'',adding “the fact that neo-Nazis succeeded in infiltrating the bullring and mounting the banner should itself be investigated as a dangerous breach of security.”

“Over and above the arrest and punishment of those responsible,” the Centre called on Spain “to join Germany and other EU members in the campaign to ban the swastika as a politicalsymbol.”

“It is time for this emblematic scourge to be forever removed from the continent of Europe soaked in the blood of its 60 million victims,”concluded Samuels.

For further information please contact Dr. Shimon Samuels on 00(33)609770158.