One eye, no ears, deformed bodies. The Acerra lambs, 20 years ago, were the symbol of the environmental horror of the Terra dei Fuochi. They ate contaminated grass, drank poisoned water, died or were born already doomed. Those images shocked the public, but to those who lived there, they were no surprise. It was confirmation that the ground beneath their feet was killing.
Vincenzo and Mario Cannavacciuolo knew this. Shepherds, generations in contact with the soil, with animals, with the cycle of nature. Vincenzo was the first to denounce, the first to say: look. Look at what is happening. For this he paid a heavy price: he died of lung cancer in 2007. Mario, however, did not give up. He continued to fight, with his son Alessandro, and founded the Terra dei Fuochi Committee. Together they carried on the legal battle, succeeding in convicting the entrepreneurs responsible for turning Campania into a clandestine dump.
And today, after decades of silence and omertà, the ruling of the European Court of Human Rights comes like a hammer blow. The Italian state has been found guilty of failing to protect the health of its citizens, of turning a blind eye whilst industrial waste was buried unchecked.
“This ruling is mostly for my father and uncle,” says Alessandro Cannavacciuolo. “They finally got justice, but the dead will not give them back to us.”
The sheep were seized, and tests confirmed what they already knew: high concentrations of dioxin and other toxic substances were present in the animals’ blood, as well as that of the Cannavacciuolo brothers. It was the poison of years of illegal spills, the indelible mark of a violated territory.
Yet, the battle is not over. Because sentences do not bring people back to life, they do not purify the air, they do not reclaim the fields. But this is a victory that marks a before and an after. And those who fought for the truth can say today that they did not fight in vain.
