The Diplomat
The Ministers of Foreign Affairs, Arancha González Laya, and of Defense, Margarita Robles, received yesterday at the air base of Torrejón de Ardoz (Madrid) the bodies of the Spanish journalists David Beriain and Roberto Fraile, whose murder in Burkina Faso was condemned yesterday in a joint declaration by the governments of Spain, France, Germany and Italy.
The mortal remains of Beriain and Fraile arrived yesterday in an Airbus A310 at the Torrejón de Ardoz base, where they were received by the two ministers, representing the Government and with full honors, and by the relatives of the deceased. Among those present was also the Irish ambassador to Spain, Sile Maguire, to receive the body of the Irish conservationist Rory Young, co-founder of the NGO Chengeta Wildlife, who also died, as well as a Burkina Faso citizen, in last Tuesday’s ambush in the east of the African country.
Hours before their arrival, the Government had announced, and the two ministers confirmed yesterday, that the Council of Ministers will award, at its next meeting, the Grand Cross of the Order of Civil Merit to the two murdered Spanish journalists. “This is the tribute we want to pay to Beriain and Fraile for their work in pursuit of a media that enhances our democracy”, declared González Laya at the Torrejón base.
Likewise, the Minister of Foreign Affairs expressed her gratitude to the Government of Burkina Faso, which “was committed from the first moment to identify the bodies and facilitate the procedures for their repatriation” and which has committed itself to “clarify what happened” and to “identify who is behind these terrible terrorist acts so that the perpetrators can be brought to justice”.
“If we have learned one lesson from this terrible event, it is the importance for our country to continue to support efforts for peace and stability in the Sahel”, she added. The Sahel countries “are our neighbors’ neighbors” and represent “an area of enormous turbulence and great geopolitical and geostrategic risks”, she added. For this reason, the Government will continue to promote, from the EU and NATO, “all efforts to achieve peace, stability and economic and social progress in this region, because the peace and stability of our country are also at stake”.
For her part, Margarita Robles assured that Spain will be “implacable against terrorism in the Sahel” and will do “everything possible to clarify what happened”, and announced that Spanish agents of the CNI “from the first moment joined the investigations, with magnificent collaboration with the services of Burkina Faso and also of other countries”. The assassination of Beriain and Fraile has been claimed by the Support Group for Islam and Muslims (JNIM), an Al Qaeda affiliate in the African country. The Prosecutor’s Office of the National Court (Audiencia Nacional) has opened informative proceedings in relation to this case.
Joint declaration
On the other hand, the governments of Spain, France, Germany and Italy issued yesterday a joint statement in which they expressed their “firm condemnation of all acts of violence” following “the atrocious murders of two Spanish citizens, an Irish national and a Burkina Faso national, perpetrated during the terrorist attack in Burkina Faso”, and reiterated their support for the fight against terrorism in the Sahel “in the framework of a cross-cutting approach that brings together security, governance, stabilization and development”.
The four countries therefore pledged to continue “existing initiatives to support the region’s armies, as well as the gendarmerie and internal security forces in their operations, their training, their training and the strengthening of their capacities, in particular with regard to respect for judicial procedures and human rights”. However, they warned, “to achieve a secure, stable and prosperous Sahel, the security approach is not sufficient and must be accompanied by humanitarian aid, stabilization and economic and social development measures, with a particular focus on education, health and access to basic services for the entire population in the integrity of the territory”.
“We thus express our willingness to maintain our joint efforts of close cooperation with the countries of the region and the G5 Sahel, within the framework of the Sahel Coalition, the Sahel Alliance, the Partnership for Security and Stability in the Sahel (P3S) and other regional initiatives, to ensure that this region becomes a zone of peace and stability, where terrorism and violence have no place”, the statement concluded.
