Sponsored by the Vienna City Hall, the Austrian Resistance Document Center, the Mexican Embassy, and with the presence of the International Raoul Wallenberg Foundation, a street of the Austrian capital bearing the name ”Promenade Gilberto Bosques” was inaugurated on June 4th, 2003, paying tribute to the Mexican diplomat who helped save Jews and other persecuted by Nazism during the Holocaust.
The street dedicated to Gilberto Bosques is placed on the 22nd district of Vienna, just meters away from the ”Raoul Wallenberg” street. Laura Bosques and María Teresa Mock Bosques, daughters of the diplomat, among other personalities, attended the ceremony of inauguration.
Austria thus recognizes, through an initiative of Dr. Christian Kloyber, investigator of the Austrian exile of the Institute for Adult Education of the Austrian Secretary of Education, the strong opposition of the Mexican government to the invasion and annexation of Austria by Germany in 1938.
On behalf of Mr Baruch Tenembaum, founder of the FIRW, Dr Kloyber presented a Gilberto Bosques’ commemorative medal to each one of the savior diplomat’s daughters.
Sent by the Mexican president Lázaro Cárdenas, Gilberto Bosques Saldívar (1892-1995) arrived to the city of Marseille, France, where he acted as General Consul. As such, Bosques gave specific instructions to the consulate staff to help save any person who wanted to leave to Mexico.
Captured by the Nazis along with dozens of diplomats from other countries, he stayed a year in prison at the German Town of Bad Godesberg, near Bonn. After an agreement between Germany and Mexico, Bosques was released and returned to his native country.
Bosques belongs to the category of diplomats who did their best to rescue the persecuted, such as Raoul Wallenberg, Sempo Sugihara, Aristides de Sousa Mendes or Hiram Bingham IV, among other exemplary officials.
In 1944 Bosques, author of a vast literary work, wrote in one of his numerous articles: ”I made the politics of my country, of help, of material and moral support to the heroic defenders of the Spanish Republic, to the brave paladins of the fight against Hitler, Mussolini, Franco, Petain and Laval.”
The International Raoul Wallenberg Foundation has produced the first web page in Spanish dedicated to the Mexican savior and is planning to organize a tribute ceremony at the Mexican capital during 2003.
