Algeciras pays tribute today to one of its most beloved sacristans, Diego Valencia, of the Church of Our Lady of La Palma, who was murdered a year ago by the alleged jihadist Yassine Kanjaa, a 25-year-old young man who caused real panic in the city. Cadiz on January 25, 2023 while carrying out a terrorist attack against several parishes.
The event in memory of the victim, called by the town council with the support of the religious's relatives, will be held at 7:45 p.m. in the Plaza Alta, the place where Valencia, who had already received a stab wound in the abdomen, , fell to the ground trying to flee from the aggressor, but where he was caught and finished off.
That fateful afternoon a priest, Father Antonio Rodríguez Lucena, 74, who worked in the Chapel of San Isidro, was also seriously injured, and he managed to recover some time later.
Today marks one year since chaos, fear and indignation turned the city black, a place of 140,000 inhabitants where 140 different religions coexist peacefully and where everyone condemned the attack, an act that is still being judged. by the National Court.
Meanwhile, Diego Valencia's family has sent an open letter to the media in which they have thanked "the countless expressions of affection" received throughout this year, "as proof and demonstration that his life (that of the sacristan) and that of so many other people belonging to the church, was and is loaded with meaning. It has been "12 hard months," said those close to him, a time in which "we have missed his figure and remembered the fatal circumstances in which he died." "We have done it from the meditation that our state of mind demanded," being aware "at all times of the support that friends and strangers have given us." That is why they have thanked all of them for "their generous closeness and selfless solidarity, without which it would sincerely have been difficult to endure the pain generated."
The family has commented that the sacristan "rests protected by the Virgin of La Palma" and they have asked the Lord to "have mercy on those who generate and have generated so much evil in the world, because they are not aware of their actions." "Above them, there remains the work of God and of the people who, like our dear and beloved Diego, dedicate their lives to putting the word of the Lord into practice, from faith, hope and charity," they stated.
Diego, as one of his friends explained to this newspaper shortly after his death, was a very loved person in the city. Linked to the world of brotherhood and a lover of carnival, he had a wide circle of friends and acquaintances, and all of them defined him as a good person committed to others. His surprising death left Algeciras society immersed in pain and indignation.
In fact, according to some witnesses, the sacristan, who would have thrown the aggressor out of the temple days before the attack, left the catechism he was giving, alerted by the screams of the parishioners and confronted the young man. It was at that moment when he received a machete blow to the abdomen that made him retreat into the sacristy and try to escape. Shortly afterwards, outdoors, in the Plaza Alta, he would fall to the ground and receive other blows from the aggressor that turned out to be fatal.
The mayor of Algeciras, José Ignacio Landaluce, announced that this act of memory will take place at 7:45 p.m. in the Plaza Alta, the point where the attacks began and where the sacristan died. "Let's hope that as many of us as we can are there to show our affection for the families, the memory of those who are missing and, without a doubt, the rejection of terrorism and the rejection of any act of violence," Landaluce said about this call. It should be noted that after the rally, at 8:00 p.m., a funeral mass will begin in the Church of Our Lady of La Palma in memory of the former sacristan of this temple.
Yassine Kanjaa, the attacker of Moroccan origin, was arrested the same night of the incident and assured the agents that he felt "a chosen one" of Allah and that the murder of the religious "opened the doors of paradise" for him. He is being tried for the National Court in Madrid, although his lawyer has requested on several occasions that his case be tried in Algeciras, which has been rejected by the judge investigating the case.
In this sense, it is worth noting that last November the magistrate agreed to prosecute him for a crime of terrorist murder and another of terrorist injuries, explaining that the first could lead to permanent, reviewable prison. Likewise, he decided to keep him in provisional prison and impose a bail of 100,000 euros.
