{"id":107756,"date":"2025-10-29T22:02:08","date_gmt":"2025-10-29T22:02:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/107756\/"},"modified":"2025-10-29T22:02:08","modified_gmt":"2025-10-29T22:02:08","slug":"spain-flood-region-leader-faces-murderer-jibes-at-state-memorial","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/107756\/","title":{"rendered":"Spain flood region leader faces \u2018murderer\u2019 jibes at state memorial"},"content":{"rendered":"

As the event ended, they again hurled insults at him, with the cries including \u201cresign\u201d, \u201cson of a bitch\u201d, and \u201cyou should be in prison\u201d.<\/p>\n

Others had tried to shout them down, asking for respect.<\/p>\n

Learning \u2018lessons\u2019 <\/p>\n

\"NaiaraNaiara Chulia Beitia, who lost her husband during the floods, embraces King Felipe after delivering a speech at a state memorial on the one-year anniversary of the disaster. Photo \/ Oscar Del Pozo, AFP<\/p>\n

King Felipe VI, Queen Letizia and Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez led political leaders, senior officials and mourners at Valencia\u2019s City of Arts and Sciences, a cultural and architectural complex.<\/p>\n

Felipe, who rarely makes political interventions, indirectly referred to the controversy in a speech that emphasised the need to \u201ccontinue analysing the causes and circumstances of the tragedy\u201d.<\/p>\n

Such action aimed \u201cto rigorously and calmly draw the necessary lessons to improve our ability to face other major catastrophes in the future, and avoid or minimise their worst consequences as much as possible\u201d, he said.<\/p>\n

Around 800 relatives of the victims were present, a handful of them wearing shirts showing photographs of their deceased loved ones. One bore the words \u201cThey were avoidable deaths\u201d, and another \u201cJustice\u201d.<\/p>\n

The proceedings included the reading out of each victim\u2019s name, a dirge, speeches by relatives of the victims and a minute\u2019s silence.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor us, the most important thing is that truth, respect and humanity prevail,\u201d said Andrea Ferrari Canut, a daughter of one of the dead.<\/p>\n

In last year\u2019s disaster, torrential rain unleashed flooding that killed 229 people in towns near Valencia.<\/p>\n

Seven more people died in the neighbouring Castilla-La Mancha region, and one person died in Andalusia in the south.<\/p>\n

The deluge swept away 130,000 vehicles and damaged thousands of homes, generating 800,000 tonnes of debris.<\/p>\n

Wounds \u2018never fully heal\u2019 <\/p>\n

\"PeoplePeople attend a candlelight vigil on the one-year anniversary of the disaster in Paiporta, near Valencia. Photo \/ Jose Jordan, AFP<\/p>\n

Mazon has defended his handling of the crisis, saying its magnitude was unforeseeable and that central authorities did not provide sufficient warning about the severity of the rain.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe did our best under unimaginable circumstances, yet in many cases it was not enough, and today we must once again acknowledge that reality,\u201d Mazon said in a televised address before the memorial.<\/p>\n

More than 50,000 people took to the streets of Valencia city on Saturday to demand that Mazon resign, the latest in a string of such demonstrations.<\/p>\n

The regional Government declared a day of mourning, while the town of Paiporta, at the epicentre of the disaster, will observe three days of remembrance.<\/p>\n

-Agence France-Presse<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"As the event ended, they again hurled insults at him, with the cries including \u201cresign\u201d, \u201cson of a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":107757,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[8038,4624,1975,1887,11687,76386,48803,273,6119,1888,24925,77538,29163,23785,77539,77537,13489,19872,61390,111,139,69,381,147,2552,2029,33171,13672,28616],"class_list":["post-107756","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-environment","tag-natural","tag-anniversary","tag-at","tag-countrys","tag-criticised","tag-deadliest","tag-disaster","tag-environment","tag-faces","tag-first","tag-flood","tag-floodhit","tag-generation","tag-heavily","tag-heckled","tag-jibes","tag-leader","tag-memorial","tag-murderer","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-region","tag-science","tag-service","tag-spain","tag-spains","tag-state","tag-valencia"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/107756","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=107756"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/107756\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/107757"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=107756"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=107756"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=107756"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}