Work to exhume the victims of the Spanish Civil War (1936-39) buried in the monumental mausoleum built in honor of Franco near Madrid started on Monday, the left-wing government said.
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“Finally, and perhaps with a long delay, the Spanish democracy is giving an answer to these victims” and their families, declared on public television the spokeswoman for the executive of the socialist Pedro Sánchez, Isabel Rodríguez, who clarified that it was the moment “technical Work”.
On the basis of a so-called “Democratic Memory” law passed at the instigation of the left-wing government, this work begins less than six weeks before the July 23 snap general election, including the right-wing, which have promised to repeal that law big favorite when it comes back to power.
The aim of the work is to recover the mortal remains of 128 people who are in the “Valle de los Caídos”, which was renamed “Valle de Cuelgamuros” by the left-wing government, the responsible presidential ministry told the AFP news agency with democratic memory .
According to the daily El Pais, a laboratory made up of forensic scientists, archaeologists, geneticists and members of the scientific police has been set up in the imposing basilica, some 50 km from the Spanish capital.
“It is a task that Pedro Sánchez’s government has been pursuing for years, with the aim of recovering these bodies and returning them to their loved ones so that they can have a dignified burial,” said the Ministry of the President’s Office.
Built by the dictator Francisco Franco, the basilica with a 150-meter-high cross rests around 33,000 combatants who belonged to the two sides of the civil war: the Francoists and the Republicans. Many of them were taken there without their families being informed.
Franco’s remains had a privileged place in the basilica’s altar from his death in 1975 until they were transferred to a cemetery in a suburb of Madrid by Pedro Sánchez’s government in October 2019.
Last April, the remains of José Antonio Primo de Rivera, founder of the Falange, a fascist party that was one of the pillars of the Franco regime, were also exhumed and transferred to a civilian cemetery.
Last October, the “Democratic Memory” law came into force, one of Mr. Sánchez’s priorities, aimed in particular at recovering the remains of the victims of the Franco regime and turning the old mausoleum into a place of remembrance of that tragic period transform.
Popular Party (right) leader Alberto Núñez Feijóo confirmed last week that he would repeal that law if he came to power after the next elections, as the polls predicted, believing there were sores and divisions in the Spanish rekindle society.
The presidential ministry responded Monday that it was “not about politics, it’s just a matter of humanity.”