Spain: Racism and fascism (1)
01 January 1991
Spain: Racism and fascism
artdoc April=1995
Conservative candidate makes Franco gaffe
During the run-up to the European elections, Mercedes De la
Mereed, a candidate for the conservative Popular Party (PP)
stated that the dictator Francisco Franco `was a person who
concerned himself with the weak classes and you can't take that
away from him. He initiated social security, pensions and built
lots of houses for the poor.'
The remarks were a source of embarrassment for the PP who has
sought to convince Spaniards that the PP was modern, centrist,
and had nothing in common with Francoism (Independent 2.6.94).
New law on Holocaust denial makes nazi extradition possible
The Spanish government has passed a law criminalising those who
deny the Holocaust and paving the way for the extradition of the
81-year-old German nazi, Otto Ernst Remer.
Remer, a former Colonel under Hitler, fled to Spain in March
after his appeal against a 22-month jail sentence failed. Remer
had publicly argued that the Holocaust was a fabrication of
Jewish propaganda. In Spain, he was believed to be living in a
rented villa overlooking the Mediterranean paid for by Spanish
neo-nazis.The Spanish Circle of Friends of Europe (CEDADE) are
thought to be protecting at least 40 senior former nazi officers,
now living prosperously in Spain around the Costa del Sol,
Barcelona, or on the Balearic Islands. Previously, under the
Spanish civil code it was not an offence to deny the Holocaust,
Remer was protected from extradition. But when Remer repeated his
no-Holocaust argument during a Spanish TV interview Jewish
opinion was horrified and agitation for a new law commenced
(Independent 20.7.94).
Long sentences for the murderers of Dominican worker
Four men have been sentenced to jail terms totalling 126 years
for the murder in Madrid in November 1992 of Lucrecia Pérez (see
bulletin no.1).
The trial
During the trial, a former civil guard officer, Luis Merino, and
the three teenagers arrested alongside him, gave completely
different versions of the events leading to Lucrecia Pérez's
death in a disused discotheque. Luis Merino, the police officer,
claimed that he and his three young companions blundered
innocently into the disco, not realising that it was abandoned,
and that he fired shots into the darkness in the belief that he
and the others were about to be attacked. He denied boasting that
`three blacks have swallowed three bullets'. One of the youths
on trial with him, Martin Bravo, claimed that he had gone to the
disco in search of girls. He denied any involvement or interest
in skinhead or nazi groups, claiming that nazi regalia and
materials found in his home from the fascist Bases Autónomas
belonged to his dead brother. He could not explain why some of
the material post-dated his brother's death. Another of the
teenagers, Javier Quilez, gave the lie to the defence of Merino
and Bravo, saying that he knew the idea of going to the disco was
to frighten a few blacks. He said everyone know the disco was
abandoned and squatted by immigrants. Quilez's school notebooks,
seized by police, were covered with racist slogans and drawings.
The verdict
The judge concluded that this was a `premeditated assault to
cause bodily harm' and that the four youths formed part of a
racist and xenophobic gang. Merino was sentenced to 54 years, and
the other three to 24 years each for the killing of Lucrecia
Perez. The four were also found guilty of the attempted murder
of Cesar Augusto Vargas, who was severely wounded. This, the
first sentencing for a racist killing in Spain, also considered
the state partly responsible. The court fixed a sum of 20 million
pesetas compensation to be paid by the men or, in default, by the
government to Lucrecia's 9-year-old daughter, who lives in the
Dominican Republic, finding that the state was to blame for `a
clear lack of control' in giving a firearm to an official wh