The Italian Embassy in Addis Ababa has published online a guide to the four Italian military cemeteries in Ethiopia. The initiative, carried out in close coordination with the Office of the Defence Officer, has the objective of facilitating research on individual casualties and on the places where their remains are kept.
The guide examines the Military Cemeteries of Addis Ababa, Adrigat, Macallé and Passo Uarieu, in the Tembien area, whose management and maintenance is ensured by the Embassy thanks to the funds provided by the Commissariat General for the Honours of War victims.
The guide is available on the Embassy website and provides for each location all the data about the fallen who rest there, the description of the cemetery and the most relevant historical facts about its construction. Each of them bears witness to events that took place both during the years of the Italian occupation in Ethiopia (1936-41) and during the Second World War. Also, in the guidebook, next to a series of photographs, you can find all the practical information you need to reach and visit the cemeteries: from geographical coordinates to telephone numbers and opening hours.
“The guide – writes Ambassador Arturo Luzzi in the message that presents the publication – was born from the frequent requests for information received by the Embassy from compatriots who, being in Addis Ababa and other areas of Ethiopia, have expressed the desire to visit the Italian military cemeteries, as important places of memory both from a historical and family point of view”. “It also intends to offer food for thought on the relationship of friendship that unites Italy and Ethiopia – continues the Ambassador -. Relations between the two countries are excellent and particularly dynamic, in all sectors, from economic and commercial to educational and cultural, as evidenced by the presence in Addis Ababa of the Italian School, the Italian Cultural Institute and the offices of the Italian Agency for Development Cooperation and the Agency for Foreign Trade. Ethiopia is a strategic partner for Italy also with a view to the stability of the Horn of Africa”.The data on the casualties, made available for the first time last April, is taken from the military records filed in the Embassy, the Office of the Defence Attaché, and the Consular Chancellery.
The list of fallen soldiers is present for three of the four military cemeteries since the identity of the fallen soldiers resting in the Passo Uarieu cemetery is unknown. The last chapter is dedicated to the disused military cemeteries, i.e. the places where the bodies of the fallen were initially buried before being moved to the current four military cemeteries.
The guide can be downloaded from this website of the Italian Embassy in Addis Ababa.
