US Senate honours diplomat hero

The United States Senate has passed a resolution honouring a Portuguese diplomat who issued visas in June 1940 allowing 30,000 people to escape the Nazis, including 10,000 Jews.

Aristides de Sousa Mendes do Amaral e Abranches was Portugal’s consul-general in Bordeaux, France, before being sacked by Portuguese dictator António de Oliveira Salazar for defying his edict prohibiting the admission of Jews.

De Sousa fought unsuccessfully to clear his name and died in his homeland in 1954 in poverty and disgrace, with no family members present at his death or funeral.

History has set the record straight and two years ago Portugal’s parliament voted unanimously to memorialise de Sousa in the Pantheon in Lisbon, alongside tombs of other national heroes such as the footballer Eusébio and explorer Vasco da Gama.