Just hours before the 60th anniversary of one of the most audacious acts of sovereignty assertion of the 20th century, the national government carried out another grave act of de-Malvinization . Silently, and without providing any details about its whereabouts or condition, the authorities removed from the Malvinas and South Atlantic Islands Museum the historic Argentine flag that flew on the Malvina Islands on September 28, 1966, during the legendary Operation Condor .

The complaint was brought to light by the museum's own staff and by veterans. The decision was made under the current leadership of retired Colonel Villaruel Esteban Vilgré Lamadrid, who answers to Vice President Victoria, sparking immediate outrage from the community of war veterans, cultural and scientific professionals, and organizations that safeguard national heritage.

Operation Condor: when youth raised sovereignty

The piece, hidden from public view, is not a ceremonial museum artifact. It is one of the seven flags that 18 young activists, led by Dardo Cabo, brought to our islands after hijacking an Aerolíneas Argentinas Douglas DC-4 and landing it on a horse racing track in Puerto Argentino. That action indelibly marked the inalienable claim to popular sovereignty and exposed the British occupation to the eyes of the entire world.

Since the inauguration of the Malvinas Museum, that flag has represented one of the most valuable material testimonies of anti-colonial resistance. The audacity of those young people in 1966 has a parallel with the courage of the Argentine national team players who unfurled the banner with the slogan "The Malvinas are Argentine" at the World Cup.

The official excuse of "organizing the narrative"

In response to the scandal, the Ministry of Culture, headed by Leonardo Cifelli, attempted to distance itself from the direct order, attributing the measure to the museum's management in coordination with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs . However, the arguments put forward reveal the true ideological underpinnings of the censorship.

Official sources justified the measure by claiming a "process of reorganization and transformation" aimed at reviewing the displayed content under the premise that "no current political event should take the place of the historical and sovereign question." To refer to a historical event that will soon be 60 years old and that reaffirmed Argentina's territorial identity as a "current event" only confirms the government's systematic attempt to strip the National Cause of its combative and popular content.

They demand immediate restitution.

The rejection of the maneuver was categorical . The Malvinas Islands Ex-Combatants Center (CECIM) of La Plata formally demanded that the museum's management guarantee the "immediate and adequate conservation, identification and custody, as well as the preservation of all documentation" and demanded that the national flag be urgently returned to public display, recalling that "the flag constitutes a living material testimony of our history and of the claim of sovereignty over the Malvinas Islands."

We have issued a formal notice to the Director of the Malvinas Museum pic.twitter.com/fPf6olA3w1

While President Javier Milei was giving a speech in defense of the sovereignty of the Malvina Islands at the UN General Assembly, behind closed doors his administration continues the dirty work of making the most sacred symbols of sovereignty invisible.

First they tried to censor the people's flag in stadiums; now they hide the flag of the young people who stepped onto and symbolically recovered the islands in 1966. Popular memory, however, cannot be archived in a repository or erased by decree.