Franco repression ruled as a crime against humanity

[muriel_volestrangler]

A Spanish judge yesterday ordered the grave of poet and playwright Federico García Lorca dug up as, for the first time, the repression unleashed by the dictator General Francisco Franco was formally declared a crime against humanity.

In a controversial reversal of Spain's traditional refusal to seek out those responsible for the killings of Lorca and more than 100,000 other people, Judge Baltasar Garzón also asked investigators to provide him with information on Franco's chief henchmen and generals. Franco and his chief collaborators, Garzón said, had been responsible for "mass killings, torture and the systematic, general and illegal detentions of political opponents".

Death squads, military courts and other tribunals sent 114,000 people to their deaths during and after a three-year civil war in the 1930s that traumatised Spain for generations, according to the judge.
...
The judge explicitly said that his investigations included repression carried out until 1952, 17 years after Franco had won the civil war and established his dictatorship. Many Spaniards still find the period hard to talk about and some fear Garzón's investigation will reopen old wounds.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/oct/17/spain

This is actually from Friday's news, but I forgot to post it then, and I don't think anyone else did. I think it's interesting - some want to say "let's forget about it, and just look forward", but it does seem to me that some formal declaration of the crimes Franco and his regime committed would be good from a historical point of view.

[unhappycamper]

1. "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it" - George Santayana

k&r

[Igel]

4. This might be different.

As in Poland, the Czech Republic, and numerous other places, the past is often remembered, to the extent most people want to remember it.

It's "justice" that's at issue. South Africa had a process for dealing with it: Confess, and have no legal punishment. (It would be interesting to see if there were extra-legal punishments meted out, however.)

Poland's decided pretty much to bury the past: People know *what* happened, they've made a conscious decision not to fret over *who* caused it. It's enough to know what happened, because knowing who did things would be met with cries for punishment in the name of "justice". Distinguishing between those who did things out of conviction, out of expediency, and out of coercion would be difficult; penalizing those who have repented while letting others go free would be unfair and inevitable; penalizing everybody who's guilty would be destabilizing. The present would suffer more by the crusade for justice, it was judged, than by acknowledging the past in broad strokes.

Garzon doesn't like the legal system, specifically his court, being overruled by such social contracts and agreements that were crucial in ending oppression. As a deus ex machina over-ruling such agreements as transitory and non-binding, he makes them less likely--charging the future for the price the present would extract from the past. Fortunately, he only seems to care about big, important figures, which strikes me as odd: The imposing tyrants of the past were usually assisted by hundreds of thousands of minions, less evil or more moral than the tyrant himself only by virtue of circumstances and opportunity.

[Solly Mack]

2. K&R

Thank you for posting this

The wounds aren't old when it's the exact same fear you felt then keeping you silent now. You're still in chains..you're still oppressed....and those "old" wounds will never heal until you break from that fear. Because there is no looking forward or moving on when you carry that fear with you.

My country would do well to understand that...

There's no escaping the past by ignoring it

[malaise]

3. I'm looking forward to this with much interest

It will draw attention to current 'crimes against humanity'.

[bemildred]

5. Good, it's never too late to set the record straight. nt

[Ichingcarpenter]

6. Kissinger would make a good start

For the secret wars and the national wars he played with.
Then this band of criminals that started this one.

I hope to see it in my lifetime but with Franco that took way too long.

[bemildred]

8. Kissinger would make an excellent addition. nt

[uppityperson]

7. k&r for eventually bringing "crimes against humanity" charges. nt