On Monday, the plenary of the General Council of the Judiciary (CGPJ), the governing body of Spain’s justice system, showed their support with 15 votes in favor and 6 against, for a report prepared by judges Roser Bach and Wenceslao Olea, ruling that justification of Francoism is protected by freedom of expression.
The report also questions whether Francisco Franco’s foundation can be outlawed for justifying or defending the dictatorship of Franco and for the incitement of hatred, and violence against the victims of the 1936 coup d’etat.
“A defense of Francoism is the expression of ideas that, despite being contrary to the values of the 1978 Spanish Constitution, are protected by freedom of expression if there is not an additional element of humiliation for the victims,” the report says.
This is a position very different from that taken by Germany, in which justification of Nazism or denying the Holocaust is punishable with up to five years in prison to honor the memory of the victims.
The judiciary also proposes that the definition of a victim of the Civil War and the dictatorship have a “strictly administrative” nature, because “historical truth is not part of the criminal process.”
Josep Goded 