German President's apology to Ligiades
Arriving in the village of Ligiades in northwestern Greece on Friday, visiting German President Joachim Gauck expressed his country's formal apology for the atrocities suffered by villagers at the hands of German troops, during the Nazi occupation of WWII.
"I wish to express what the culprits but also those politically responsible over the years in the post-war period did not want to or could not say: that what happened here was a brutal injustice. With a sense of shame and anguish, I want to say sorry to the families of those who were murdered," he said according to ANA-MPA
Earlier, the German president had laid a wreath at a monument for the fallen, who were killed in a mass execution carried out by the Nazi regime on October 3, 1943.
During his speech, Gauck declared himself shocked at the "robberies, terrorist actions and murders committed by a country that had become a ruthless dictatorship".
"I bow before the victims of the horrific crimes that were committed here and in so many other places in Greece," he said. Gauck noted that such places made him feel a "double shame", both that people raised within German culture had become murderers but also because democratic Germany, from the moment that it started to gradually process its past with a critical eye, had learned so little from its guilt concerning the Greeks.
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