His decision to move Franco’s tomb is on firmer political ground. It is in line with the 2011 recommendations of a national commission endorsed by the United Nations, and a decision by parliament in 2017. [...]
“A country that looks to its future needs to be at peace with its past,” Sánchez told parliament in June. “Wounds have remained open for many years, too many, and it’s time to heal them. Our democracy will have symbols that unite citizens, not ones that separate them.”
But Sánchez’s decision still carries risks. It leaves him open to accusations that while he claims to be healing the wounds of the past, he is actually reopening them by harking back to a dark and divisive period in Spain’s history. [...]
Francisco Ferrándiz, a researcher at the National Council of Research (CSIC) who has studied repression under Franco, said he often guides foreign guests around the complex. He always includes a daily mass celebrated in honor of Franco by Benedictine monks who live in the attached abbey and whom he described as hardline Franco supporters. Many visitors, he said, can’t believe their eyes. [...]
A major CIS study from 2008 — the most recent on the issue — showed most Spaniards supported actions such as excavating mass graves to give victims of Franco a proper burial, getting rid of symbols glorifying the dictator and annulling the verdicts of political trials. But efforts to investigate human rights violations or put on trial perpetrators of abuses didn’t gather the same level of support.
