Thiaroye massacre

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Wall painting in memory of the Thiaroye massacre in Dakar, Senegal: Une histoire inoubliable

The Thiaroye massacre was perpetrated on December 1, 1944 in the Camp de Thiaroye military base by French colonial troops against insurgent Tirailleurs sénégalais . As a result of the ongoing urbanization of the Cap-Vert peninsula, the base, at that time far outside Dakar , is now in the midst of the dense urban development of the metropolis of Pikine and is part of the Thiaroye Gare district .

procedure

After their World War II deployment in Europe, largely freed from German captivity in occupied France, around 1300 of the Tirailleurs sénégalais, known as Senegalese riflemen , were brought back to Senegal on November 21, 1944 and were taken to the Camp de Thiaroye northeast of Dakar. Corrupt and racist colonial officials refused the promised compensation beyond good storage conditions and only made half of the official exchange available for the exchange of francs into francs CFA (officially 2 francs = 1 franc CFA at that time). When the camp inmates revolted against this, summoned soldiers shot at the insurgents and killed between 35 and 300 people according to various sources.

consequences

In March 1945, 34 so-called ringleaders were sentenced to prison terms of between one and ten years. Five of them died in custody. The remaining prisoners were given amnesty due to increasing public pressure in March 1947 during a visit by the new French President Vincent Auriol . However, they were not restored to their old rights and received neither compensation nor the pensions to which they were entitled.

Word of the events spread quickly in Africa. The events were portrayed in the film Camp de Thiaroye by the Senegalese writer and combatant Ousmane Sembène .

In 2004, August 23rd was proclaimed as journée du tirailleur in Senegal as a national day of remembrance. The day before, President Abdoulaye Wade laid a wreath in the Camp Thiaroye cemetery and declared it a "national cemetery". On December 1, 2014, President Macky Sall unveiled a memorial for the victims of 1944 at this location in the presence of François Hollande . On this occasion, the French President described the events of 1944 as "simply terrible, unbearable (simplement épouvantables, insupportables)".

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ jeuneafrique of August 30, 2017: Sénégal. Plus de soixante-dix ans après, le massacre de Thiaroye reste dans les mémoires

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