The Minister of Territorial Policy and Democratic Memory considers the UN’s response to be “an irrefutable endorsement of the Government’s stance in defence of Democratic Memory and human rights”, in the face of the repeal of Aragon’s Democratic Memory Law and the so-called “concord” laws in Castile and León and the Valencian Community.
The UN endorses the Spanish Government’s defence of Democratic Memory
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The Minister of Territorial Policy and Democratic Memory, Ángel Víctor TorresThe Minister of Territorial Policy and Democratic Memory, Ángel Víctor Torres.
The Minister of Territorial Policy and Democratic Memory, Ángel Víctor Torres, considers that these regional governments should sit down to negotiate the legislative texts because, “forcefully”, the rapporteurs who have jointly signed the communication state that these initiatives go against the values of the Law of Democratic Memory, violate human rights, make the victims of serious human rights violations invisible, and violate international standards and international treaties signed by Spain.
Torres reviewed the content of this “unanimous, devastating and categorical” communication signed by the Special Rapporteur on the promotion of truth, justice, reparation and guarantees of non-repetition, the Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances and the Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions.
The minister pointed out that, in the case of Aragon, the UN detects that there is no explicit reference to the violation of human rights, nor does it expressly condemn the regime and its dictatorial nature. They also point out that the text does not refer to human rights violations during Franco’s regime as in the previous law, but to the “atrocities committed by one side in the civil war”, while it does cite the political violence committed during the Second Republic. For the minister, “This is a fact that stands out because one cannot compare 40 years of dictatorship with a democratic period”.
As for Castilla y León, the rapporteurs highlight the suppression of the word “dictatorship” to refer to the historical period of Franco’s regime. And they add that the violation of human rights is made invisible by refusing to name and condemn the dictatorial regime despite its undeniable responsibility.
Regarding the proposed law of the Valencian Region, the minister also stressed that the UN communication considers that it distorts the purpose of the previous memory laws (state and regional) because it also refers to the victims of the Second Republic. They emphasise that all the commissions and bodies created under the previous law are being dissolved and that the processes of memory already underway are to be suppressed.
Torres went on to explain the content of the communication, which “is not from the Spanish government, nor does it come from me, but from the UN”, stressing that the new laws order the suppression of entities and projects and hinder or eliminate the possibility of subsidies. According to the minister, this would make the continuity of exhumations, for example, carried out by these non-profit organisations, uncertain.
Finally, the minister explained that bearing in mind that the law already approved is that of the Cortes de Aragón, “at the beginning of next week we will officially communicate the interposition of article 33.2 of the Organic Law of the Constitutional Court”, which would entail the start of bilateral negotiations, “if the Government of Aragón accepts it”, which would be the step before the appeal before the Constitutional Court.