Sir, – Your Editorial on Judge Baltasar Garzón (February 13th) claims the Spanish Supreme Court, in its unanimous decision, “got things wrong”. It is painful for a Spanish reader to read such arrogance in a foreign newspaper.
You imply in it that transition to democracy in Spain did not deal honestly with the grim legacy of crimes against humanity perpetrated by Gen Franco.
What you don’t explain is that there was common agreement by all concerned in the mid-1970s that seeking vengeance on the Right by the Left would make that very transition to democracy impossible.
Perhaps your readers will be willing to listen to the view of a well-regarded American historian of contemporary Spain. In his book Spain: A Unique History,Stanley G Payne explains that, for it to be successful (even possible) one requirement of the Spanish transition from the Franco regime to democracy in 1975 was "rejection of the politics of vengeance, which meant eschewing any political or judicial quest for historical justice."
It was not until 1993 when the Socialist party led by Felipe Gonzalez was losing ground to the Popular Party of Aznar that the Socialists embraced the need for a " memoria historica". Mr Zapatero endorsed this policy of unearthing the crimes of the past (only those committed by the otherside, of course) as an integral part of his electoral campaign to regain power from Aznar.
How is it that your newspaper can judge this case more “correctly” than all the judges of a Supreme Court? Surely not all of them (if any) could be corrupt? Might it be that the decision they took was not the politically “correct” one? – Yours, etc,
Sir, – Many people throughout the free world will regret the decision of the Spanish Supreme Court to disbar Judge Baltasar Garzón from his profession for the next 11 years. Perhaps his penchant for lifting judicial rocks to look at the unsavoury past of former dictators was
too close to home
when he set about investigating the crimes of Gen Francisco Franco’s military government, crimes that successive Spanish governments and their judiciary have always preferred to keep under wraps.
Despite this decision,
it should never be forgotten that Garzón
was the first to send out signals to tyrants all over the world that they could
no longer travel the free world unchallenged
when
Gen Augusto Pinochet was
arrested in London in October 1998. This followed a request from Judge Garzón for the
extradition of the former military dictator for crimes perpetrated against Spanish citizens in Chile.
Thanks to the Spanish judge much of the world is no longer the playground of political criminals and even people like Henry Kissenger must carefully plan their travel arrangements. – Yours, etc,