[News] The Trial of Judge Baltasar Garzon

[Anti-Imperialist News]

January 31, 2012
http://www.counterpunch.org/2012/01/31/the-trial-of-judge-baltasar-garzon/

“An Offense to All Democratic Forces in the World”


The Trial of Judge Baltasar Garzon

by VINCENT NAVARRO

In 1936, a democratic government was forced to 
face a military coup led by General Franco.  The 
coup succeeded because it had the support of the 
majority of the Spanish armed forces which were 
well-equipped and supported by Hitler in Germany 
and Mussolini in Italy.  Without that assistance, 
the coup would not have prevailed.  The purpose 
of the coup was to stop the popular reforms 
carried out by the democratically elected 
progressive government opposed by the Church, 
banking community, finance companies, large 
employers, armed forces, and the usual cast of 
characters that became the major axis of the 
horrible dictatorship that was established at 
that time in Spain and which lasted until 1978.

To ensure its survival, the dictatorship required 
and maintained an enormous apparatus of 
repression carried out by the Fascist party, La 
Falange, the armed forces and the Church.  For 
every political assassination Mussolini ordered 
in Italy, Franco killed 10,000, according to 
Professor Malekafis, expert in European 
fascism.  As a result of that fascist repression, 
Spain became the European country with the 
largest number of people who disappeared due to 
political assassinations.  Even today, their 
families do not know where they are buried.  How can that be?

To be able to answer that question, it is 
necessary to understand the enormous limitations 
of  Spanish democracy (1978-2011), the outcome of 
a transition from dictatorship to democracy that 
took place during the period 1976-1978 under the 
dominance of the ultra-right wing forces that 
supported and benefited from the fascist 
state.  The transition was based on a pact of 
silence, Ley de Amnistia, according to which all 
political forces, including the left wing 
parties, had to agree not to look at the past, 
that is, not to look for responsibility or 
accountability for those terrible crimes 
committed during the fascist dictatorship in 
Spain.  That silence meant the disappeared 
persons remained disappeared and their memory lost.

But the grandchildren of the disappeared started 
asking what had happened to their grandparents 
and where they were buried.  They wanted to have 
a tomb they could visit and bring flowers to once 
a year. And they wanted to pay homage to their 
fight for freedom, the cause for which they were 
assassinated.  In this way, a popular movement 
began which demanded the Spanish state 
(supposedly a democratic state) find the 
disappeared and honor them.  The state, governed 
then by the socialist party, resisted any 
response to that demand, even though many of the 
disappeared were members and sympathizers of that party in the 30s and 40s.

But responding to that pressure, Judge Baltasar 
Garzón, who had become known internationally 
because of his intention to judge the dictator 
Augusto Pinochet (an admirer of General Franco 
and trained in the Spanish military school), 
started an investigation and requested the state 
find the disappeared and pay homage to those 
whose bodies had not yet been found.  Judge 
Garzón soon discovered the numbers were much 
higher than previously believed.  The numbers 
started with 30,000 and by the end of 2008 they 
had increased to 152,000.  And still the numbers 
continue to grow.  People began to lose their 
fear and came out publicly with the names of 
their dead, proving they had been assassinated, 
but not knowing where they had been killed and 
where their bodies were.  It soon became a mass 
phenomenon and the numbers grew so large that 
many believe the killings of the disappeared could be referred to as genocide.

As predicted, the right wing forces and some 
voices within the left immediately mobilized, 
accusing Judge Garzón of not respecting the Ley 
de Amnistia that was supposed to have put to rest 
any possibility of judging these crimes.  And 
none other than La Falange, the fascist party, 
still legal in Spain, and other allied forces 
brought Judge Garzón to the Supreme Court to 
stand trial.  The Supreme Court accepted the 
legal arguments and recently started proceedings against Judge Garzón.

A few days ago, January 24, this judge had to sit 
in front of the Supreme Court for daring to ask 
the Spanish state to find and honor the 
disappeared ones and find those responsible for 
their killings.  It started a process unique in 
Europe at this time where a judge defending human 
rights, freedom and democracy is put on trial for 
upholding the honor and dignity of democratic 
forces.  This trial is an offense to all 
democratic persons in the world and a 
mobilization of protest should occur worldwide 
against what is occurring in Spain at this time.

VINCENT NAVARRO, Professor of Public Policy, The 
Johns Hopkins University. He is a contributor to 
Hopeless: Barack Obama and the Politics of 
Illusion, forthcoming from AK Press.




Freedom Archives
522 Valencia Street
San Francisco, CA 94110

415 863-9977

www.Freedomarchives.org  
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://freedomarchives.org/pipermail/news_freedomarchives.org/attachments/20120131/931bb5f6/attachment.htm>