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Tribute to Resistance fighters René Borghini and Esther Poggio
In the presence of H.S.H. the Sovereign Prince, Minister of State Serge Telle, President of the National Council Christophe Steiner, French Ambassador Marine de Carné-Trécesson, and senior officials from the Principality, a ceremony was recently held on Ruelle de Chanoine Franzi to pay tribute to two figures of the French Resistance on the Côte d’Azur who were arrested in Monaco on 3 and 7 July 1944.
After a speech in which he recalled the commitment shown by the two martyrs and outlined his vision for remembrance of the period, H.S.H. the Sovereign Prince unveiled a plaque on the outside of the National Council building. The plaque honours the memory of René Borghini, the former Secretary to the President of the National Council and member of an intelligence network, and Esther Poggio, his liaison officer, who were shot by German soldiers on 15 August 1944 in the Nice district of Ariane as part of a crackdown in connection with the Allied landing in Provence on the same day.
The ceremony drew to a close with the traditional bugle call La sonnerie aux morts and a minute’s silence. It was attended, in addition to the families of the two Resistance fighters, by the Fédération des Groupements Français de Monaco (Federation of French Groups in Monaco), the Comité de commémoration d’époque (Committee for the Commemoration of the Period) and La mémoire des fusillés de l’Ariane (Association to Commemorate Those Shot at Ariane).