BRUSSELS, 16 March 2004 — Europe paid silent and emotional tribute yesterday to the 200 people massacred in last week’s Madrid train bombings, observing three minutes’ silence across the continent at midday, Spanish time.
From Paris to Prague, countries responded to a call by the Irish EU presidency, recalling the mark of respect paid after the Sept. 11, 2001 suicide plane attacks in the United States. In Berlin, nearly 100 people held a somber gathering before the Spanish Embassy in the center of the capital while companies and public institutions throughout the country observed three minutes of silence.
In the eastern city of Dresden, the bells of the Church of Our Lady, which was destroyed by Allied bombing in 1945, rang out at midday. Cars and buses stopped on their routes in several German cities. In Britain, people stood silently in main railway stations, while members of Parliament joined in the tribute. In Dublin, Prime Minister Bertie Ahern stood silent next to the Spanish charge d’affaires to Ireland.
In the Vatican, Pope John Paul II joined in a “moment of meditation” for the victims of the Madrid attacks, and also devoted his daily 7:00 a.m. mass to the victims and their families, his spokesman Joaquin Navarro Valls said. In Italy all public buildings, schools, universities and military barracks were called on to join the tribute. In Bulgaria, which lost four of its nationals in the Madrid blasts, President Georgy Parvanov attended a service at Sofia’s Alexandre Nevski cathedral. The three minutes’ silence was also observed in Romania, which at the last count had lost 11 of its nationals in the attacks, with six still missing and presumed dead.
European Commission chief Romano Prodi led a show of silent solidarity in Brussels.
