- Title: Spain's new democratic memory bill tackles dictator Franco's legacy
- Date: 20th July 2021
- Summary: JIMENA DE LA FRONTERA, SPAIN (JULY 20, 2021) (REUTERS) VARIOUS OF ENRIQUE ROJAS, RELATIVE OF PEOPLE EXECUTED BY THE FRANCO REGIME, POINTING AT NAMES OF PEOPLE EXECUTED (SOUNDBITE) (Spanish) RELATIVE OF PEOPLE EXECUTED UNDER FRANCO'S REGIME, ENRIQUE ROJAS, 68, SAYING: "During the excavation they found 13 (people shot dead) and some others believed to be shot dead in two mass graves, but it is full of people that were not buried properly. This year we found five and now in this area, I believe my five great uncles are buried here." VARIOUS OF DIGGER WORKING VARIOUS OF ARCHAEOLOGIST MARIA JOSE GAMEZ WORKING BONE FOUND MASS GRAVE (SOUNDBITE) (Spanish) ARCHAEOLOGIST MARIA JOSE GAMEZ, SAYING: "Right now we are searching and exhuming people who were residents of Jimena de la Frontera. In this mass grave we have found five people, last year in two different mass graves we found six and seven, respectively, out of the 34. We are looking for 35 people in this cemetery." BONES FOUND IN MASS GRAVE PLACED ON TABLE PHOTOS OF PEOPLE SHOT DEAD DURING FRANCO'S REGIME AND BONES FOUND IN MASS GRAVE GAMEZ RECONSTRUCTING THE SKULL OF A PERSON SHOT IN THE HEAD, BULLET SEEN ON THE TABLE (SOUNDBITE) (Spanish) ARCHAEOLOGIST MARIA JOSE GAMEZ, SAYING: "I think small steps are being taken but they are necessary steps after more than 80 years. I think that with the government we have this could go forward more. It is true that we truly need a DNA bank because many mass graves are being opened along the peninsula and it would make it much easier to identify people." GAMEZ NEXT TO BONES FOUND IN MASS GRAVE BONES FOUND IN MASS GRAVE
- Embargoed: 3rd August 2021 16:10
- Keywords: Franco's regim Spanish dictator Francisco Franco Spanish dictatorship democracy democratic memory fascism
- Location: MADRID, SAN LORENZO DE EL ESCORIAL, EL PARDO & JIMENA DE LA FRONTERA, SPAIN
- City: MADRID, SAN LORENZO DE EL ESCORIAL, EL PARDO & JIMENA DE LA FRONTERA, SPAIN
- Country: Spain
- Topics: Europe,Government/Politics
- Reuters ID: LVA007EMNBTC7
- Aspect Ratio: 16:9
- Story Text: Spain's government approved on Tuesday (July 20) a new "democratic memory" bill to tackle the legacy of General Francisco Franco's 1939-1975 dictatorship and the civil war, with measures honouring those who suffered persecution or violence.
Fourteen years after Spain passed its first "historic memory" law, the new legislation drafted by the left-wing government aims to eliminate loopholes and cover a wider range of victims and crimes related to Francoism, as well as promote the search and exhumations of victims buried in mass graves.
If passed into law, the bill will create two official remembrance days to honour the victims and the exiled, and an official registry of the victims will be set up.
Government estimates point to 114,000 civilians who disappeared, presumably killed, behind Franco forces' lines during the war and throughout the dictatorship.
Franco's legacy remains a divisive issue in Spain, especially following the rise of the hard-right Vox party in the past few years.
In a news conference following the cabinet meting in which the bill was passed, Felix Bolanos, the minister in charge of the bill, said the government was seeking to safeguard and promote the values of democracy and human rights.
"The main goals of the democratic memory bill passed today are two. First, to recover, safeguard and promote democratic values and fundamental rights, history and to vindicate them along modern history," the presidency minister said.
"The second goal of the bill is to recognize every victim of the coup that took place in July 1936 and the dictatorship that came after," he added.
The bill, which will be sent to parliament for approval, declares null and void the convictions and penalties handed down by Francoist repressive bodies over people's political and other beliefs, or sexual orientation.
The relatives of the victims of Franco's regime have long demanded investigations to know what happened to their loved ones and Bolanos vowed the new law would help clarify the crimes committed during the dictatorship.
"With the bill we guarantee that every human rights violation committed from the coup until the foundation of the constitution will be investigated," Bolanos said.
It will also redefine the grandiose Franco-era monument known as "The Valley of the Fallen", where Franco had been buried until 2019, as a cemetery to hold the remains of people killed on both sides of the 1936-39 Civil War.
68-year-old Enrique Rojas is one of the hundreds of Spaniards that have been struggling to find the remains of their relatives. He collaborates in the digging of a mass grave in Jimena de la Frontera cemetery, in the south of Spain.
As he pointed to a stone with the names of missing people executed by Franco's he explained how he hope to find his great uncles.
"During the excavation they found 13 (people shot dead) and some others believed to be shot dead in two mass graves, but it is full of people that were not buried properly. This year we found five and now in this area, I believe my five great uncles are buried here," he said.
Most of the diggings and investigations of mass graves have been found by associations and relatives but under the new law, the government will provide founds and create a DNA bank so help identify the remains.
The bill also states no one can be buried in a place of prominence in the complex, meaning the remains of the fascist Falange party's founder, Jose Antonio Primo de Rivera, will have to be removed. Franco's remains were reburied in a family crypt in 2019.
(Production: Silvio Castellanos, Guillermo Martinez, Jon Nazca, Juan Antonio Dominguez, Marco Trujillo, Emma Pinedo") - Copyright Holder: REUTERS
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