https://www.podbean.com/media/share/pb-ev2qs-1b0b032
June 1940, Bordeaux: as France collapsed under the German advance, Portuguese consul Aristides de Sousa Mendes turned a humble visa stamp into a lifeline, issuing transit papers that opened a corridor through Spain to neutral Portugal and helped thousands escape persecution and war.
Acting against Lisbon’s restrictive directives, Sousa Mendes used the tools of the state to defy it — a mass, bureaucratic rescue that carried grave personal and political consequences when the authoritarian regime moved to punish his disobedience.
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