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"Belief, and the Will to Win"
Movimento Patriótico
www.portugal-livre.00freehost.com
CONFLITO INTERNACIONAL DE OLIVENÇA
Ligações:
Forum Olivença
Manifesto Portugal
OlivencaOnline
Informação Olivença
Campanha por Olivença
1000 YEARS OF HISTORY
IT WAS in the year 868 that Vimara Peres took destiny in his hands and drove the Moors out of the community of Portuscale on the banks of the Douro. The fight for Freedom had begun... From this date until 1095 a number of Counts of Portuscale were to follow. An attempt to breakaway from King Alfonso VI of León was made by Count Nuno Mendes in 1071 which ended in failure.
When in 1128 Afonso Henriques was just 19 and Portuscale's (now called County Portucalense) autonomy looked precarious under his mother's leadership (Countess Teresa) he took control of the situation and averted certain Galician domination.
Before going into battle against the Moors at Ourique, south of Leiria, his troops acknowledged Afonso Henriques not only their lord but also their king. A fact that his cousin, Alfonso VII, king of León, Galicia and Castile was finally to recognize at Zamora in 1143, but independence from León and the "emperor of all Spain" came formally only in 1179 (although recognized by the Pope as such since 1143).
By 1297, to put an end to years of almost continuous warfare between Castile and Portugal whose borders had now reached the shores of the Algarve, King Ferdinand IV of Castile and King Diniz of Portugal signed the Treaty of Alcanices by which their frontiers were defined after an exchange of territories. (Castile recognized Olivença, on the east side of the Guadiana as an integral part of Portugal).
A serious situation developed from 1383 when Juan I of Castile decided to stop Fernando I of Portugal ill-advised attempts to claim the Castilian throne. A number of large invasions and battles ensued. The Castilian threat ended in 1385 with their total defeat at Aljubarrota.
After a series of unwise marriages by Manuel I with Castilian princesses and King Sebastian's catastrophic military defeat in North Africa in 1578, Portugal's independent future became uncertain. King Philip II of Spain taking advantage of the situation through bribery and force seized the throne of Portugal in 1580.
After 60 years the Portuguese broke off the yoke of a ruinous Spanish occupation and became once again independent under their new king, João IV. For 28 YEARS the Spaniards fought against the Portuguese before signing the Lisbon Peace Treaty in 1668 recognizing Portugal's independence (including its sovereignty over Olivença).
As part of Napoleon's plans, Portugal came under attack in 1801 from allied Spanish troops in the Alentejo province. Spain occupies to this day part of the Alentejo east of the Odiana (Guadiana) river, nowadays referred simply as "Olivença" in flagrant contravention of international law. It is a colony of Spain.
In the autumn of 1807 French and Spanish troops invaded Portugal occupying Lisbon and most of Portugal until July 1808 when with the help of its English allies the French were driven out and independence restored. (Olivença was recaptured in 1811 from the French then handed over to the Spaniards by the English..!).
Portugal has been a member of the European Union since 1986. A 1,000 years of history is under threat. Spain is poised to take advantage of a Europe "without frontiers" (only as far as Portugal is concerned, apparently) and dominate its economy and take control. In the 21st century, do the Portuguese really want to be servants to outsiders and have a foreign government run their country? Or will they take charge of their destiny once again and be masters of their own homeland, and keep Portugal FREE?
