«Why isn't she here anymore? Why did it happen? How could we have predicted this? But above all, what can we do to ensure tragedies like these don't happen again?"

Just over a year has passed since February 18, 2023 . One year after that event which struck and shocked the collective conscience of all of Sardinia : Chiara Carta, a thirteen-year-old from Oristano, was killed by her mother . Since that day, there have been many questions asked by Chiara's family, teachers, classmates and friends. And in the front row, in the transatlantic of the Regional Council, in Cagliari, everyone was there to try to give answers: father Piero, with relatives and friends, the teachers, the headmaster, his classmates, the institutions , the mayor of Oristano Massimiliano Sanna, the prosecutor at the juvenile court of Sassari Luisella Fenu, the president of Fidapa Oristano Pupa Tarantini.

The occasion was the presentation of the volume "Chiara, a life beyond life" , edited by the regional guarantor for childhood and adolescence Carla Puligheddu .

A book that tried to transform excruciating pain into something useful: "After the trauma, a community listens to its children to protect their rights" we read on the cover.

In Italy, in the last 20 years, there have been 535 cases of filicide . Puligheddu, starting from the tragedy of Oristano, has devised a path that puts the rights of children at the centre, starting with the fundamental right to be heard, which takes its name "Chiara Project".

The emotion is palpable in the hall of the Legislative Assembly, which was the site of a "rebirth event for little Chiara" and for all the young victims.

«A choral work, what is being done throughout Sardinia after that February 18th», explains Puligheddu. «His memory and his soul are here with us, today and always, to inspire constant commitment to the rights of minors and for greater listening and awareness on the part of adults . The project wants to go beyond the borders of Oristano, involving schools on a crucial theme: the importance of offering adolescents the tools to be protagonists of their future".

School, family and institutions must work in synergy, it was said, so that the signals are not overlooked and preventive intervention can be made in situations of family difficulty. «It is a historical moment in which we are witnessing the emergence of increasingly marked fragility in young adults, internal suffering that cries out for help and at increasingly younger ages», explains Fenu.

The difficulty therefore lies in listening, but it is also generated by a closure, increasingly pronounced in children and adults "who are unable to open up, not even with their peers, much less with parents and teachers", continues the Prosecutor. What can be done, then? «Families are not supported in parenting, it is necessary for the local health system and the entire system to focus attention on prevention», concludes the Guarantor Puligheddu. « I have a desire that I hope will soon be translated into reality: I would like to set up the "guarantor's consultation", made up of minors from various schools in Sardinia. In this way, when I go to speak to political interlocutors, I will be able to carry their voice ."

The educational challenges are increasingly greater, as are the suffering that young people carry in their bodies, which is why it is important to recognize that it is only in the alliance of all the subjects of a territory that an effective strategy can be found to provide young people with right tools to understand, deeply, that, as Massimiliano Sanna writes in the book, "violence must not prevail over tenderness".

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