“We want there to be a turning of the page, so that living here is not synonymous with bad things, that it is also synonymous with other projects, other ambitions”, the president of AVIPG, Dina Duarte, told Lusa agency.

On June 17, 2017, the fires in Pedrógão Grande, which affected other municipalities, especially Castanheira de Pera and Figueiró dos Vinhos, in the district of Leiria, caused 66 deaths and 253 injuries.

Criminal liability

The process to determine possible criminal liability for the fires has a reading of the judgment scheduled for September 13. At stake are crimes of homicide by negligence and offense to physical integrity by negligence, some of which are serious.

Dina Duarte considered that 2022 represents “a turning of the page”, because justice is underway, and said she hopes that “by the end of this year things will be stabilised, that justice will be done”.

Asked what the association understands as justice, the leader explained: “We only hope that justice brings the future in the sense that all the mistakes that were made have been learned”.

“We intend that in the future people will consider that justice is a way of changing procedures and improving a whole set of circumstances, so that the hierarchies that exist behind aid, civil protection, combat, are faster and are not so bureaucratized. And the knowledge of the terrain belongs to those who outline a strategy, whether for combat or for relief”, she added.

The official said that she wanted, “above all, to learn from what did not go well and that people do not die again”.