MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Falklands peaty soil spread in the main ring of the Palermo cattle show in Buenos Aires

Veterans at the center of the main ring, with people applauding, shouting patriotic slogans and giving support. (Pic LN)

The main Argentine agriculture and business show is annually held on the grounds of Palermo, since Saturday in its major ring where the best cattle, sheep, and horses of the event are paraded, has in the center peaty soil from the Falkland Islands.

In effect last Saturday when the Palermo agribusiness show came to an end, with all the color, pomp, display and speeches of such an occasion, there was a special homage to Argentina's Falklands war Veterans and the fallen in combat who did not return.

At midday loudspeakers announced the ceremony and a group of Veterans, some in full uniform, carrying a worn out and extended Argentine flag walked into the middle of the ring where the parades had taken place.

People stood up, shouting “Long live the mother land” and “Argentina”

It was according to the Buenos Aires media the first time the powerful Argentine Rural Society honored the Veterans at its grounds, and it was also the occasion to commemorate the fortieth anniversary of the South Atlantic conflict.

And it was particularly symbolic since the eldest brother of the Argentine Rural Society president Nicolas Pino, Esteban is a Malvinas Veteran and recalled what happened forty years ago. Esteban was 19 and had just finished his military conscription, when he was called back to the barracks.

With his brother Nicolas they took a bus from Olavarría where the family's farm was and headed for Buenos Aires, more precisely to the La Tablada regiment. Forty eight hours late he was flown to the Falklands, but on returning at the end of the war, for twenty five years he refused to talk about the combats and his experience.

“I simply couldn't talk about Malvinas,” he admitted.

With a psychologist and family support, and a friend from the war they finally wrote a book about their memories, “lest we forget”.

In the Falklands he was involved in Mount William combats, close to Stanley towards the end of the war, and finally was made prisoner.

During a week prisoners were forced to clean up the mess of the war in Stanley, and a few days later he was shipped with hundreds more to Comodoro Rivadavia.

“There they had us in the barracks feeding us on all we had missed in the Falklands with our miserable rations,” but the main factor that helped him survive was “the enormous family contention. Many of my colleagues never received it, and it has been painful, terribly painful, we have more combatants that committed suicide than dead in the war”.
Twenty years ago he left for Uruguay and currently is in the supermarket business in Montevideo.

Following on other speeches and experience accounts, the Rural Society leadership and other political officials met the Veterans at the center of the main ring, with people applauding, shouting patriotic slogans and giving support.

Then came the culmination of the event, when the Veterans who had kept for forty years, a small recipient with Falklands peaty soil, spread part of it and buried the rest.
Applause and a deafening silence for a few long seconds. An emotional Argentina paid homage to its Veterans.