Valencia is one of the places that will determine who wins the elections on May 28 and the PSOE has resorted to the tandem made up of Baltasar Garzón and the current prosecutor of the Chamber in the Supreme Court Dolores Delgado as a claim on the first day of the campaign.
The lawyer and former judge Baltasar Garzón and the former Minister of Justice and former Attorney General Dolores Delgado opened this Friday the democratic memory program “Las fosas del Francoismo”, organized by the Valencia Provincial Council.
The PSOE controls the provincial institution since 2015 and, in addition to the presidency, develops memorialist policies. The talk was given in the Alfonso el Magnanimo room of the La Beneficencia cultural center one day after the campaign officially began.
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Garzón and Delgado filled the room and the call was attended by various socialist officials. The two have been part of the PSOE lists in various electoral calls, Garzón with Felipe González and Delgado with Pedro Sánchez. The President of the Government appointed her Minister in 2018 and Attorney General a year and a half later.
During his speech, the former judge addressed the new legal framework offered by the Democratic Memory law, approved on October 19, and charged harshly against the “conservative” sector of Spanish Justice.
In this sense, he regretted that the PP has announced that it will repeal the new norm and that the Courts resort to the 1977 Amnesty Law in their resolutions so as not to investigate the crimes of Francoism.
“How long will we have to wait for the judiciary of this country to commit itself to the bloody time with the victims?” Garzón wondered to applause from the audience.
Next, he criticized the order of the Investigating Court number 1 of Ferrol on April 3, in which the free dismissal and filing of the complaint for the murder of the nationalist leader Moncho Reboiras in 1975 was agreed.
“The answer he has given is that he is protected by the 1977 Amnesty Law,” he denounced, “and this judge forgets” that the law excludes crimes against humanity or war.
“Its article 2 says that all the laws of the Spanish State, including the Law of 1977, of October 15, of Amnesty, will be interpreted and applied in accordance with conventional and customary international law and, in particular, with International Humanitarian Law. “.
Garzón pointed out that the democratic memory should be considered “a matter of State” and warned the public that the PP wants to put an end to the new legal framework.
“How can the leader of the PP, Mr. Feijóo, say that he does not comply with this law or the Constitution? We cannot keep quiet. It is a matter of respect, dignity and defense of the victims,” he said.
For this reason, he encouraged to study how to shield the norm so that memory continues to be “a right”. “In other countries these laws are untouchable, neither by the judges nor by the legislature.”
The act is the first of a program of activities, all of them free, organized by the areas of Historical Memory and Culture of the Diputación de Valencia. The provincial deputy responsible for these areas is the socialist Ramiro Rivera, a leader close to former minister José Luis Ábalos and the sector critical of Ximo Puig.
Dolores Delgado and Baltasar Garzón are a couple and this is the first time they met in public in a chat since they publicly formalized their relationship in 2020. Delgado highlighted the “vital example of dignity” that in his opinion Garzón represents and in his speech he addressed life in exile.
Another former socialist minister has also been invited to the conference program, although in this case it will not coincide with the electoral period. Former vice president Carmen Calvo will speak about 'The future of memory' on June 9, once the electoral call has been held.
In the shadow of Garzón
Dolores Delgado and Baltasar Garzón know almost everything about the National Court. Both formalized their sentimental relationship at the end of 2020.
For almost two decades they formed a closed nucleus of power also made up of judges such as Fernando Andreu and, to a lesser extent, Santiago Pedraz.. Since the prosecutor arrived at that court in 1993, she has lived in Garzón's shadow.
Delgado and Garzón during the talk.
The jurist introduced her to his Latin American circles and even sought a position for her at the International Criminal Court in The Hague when Garzón left there after being suspended for the investigations carried out against him in the Supreme Court.
After being convicted of illegal wiretapping in the Gürtel case and expelled from the judicial career, Garzón has dedicated himself to the practice of Law, taking clients with open proceedings at the National Court.
Delgado is now a prosecutor of the Supreme Court and his appointment to this position and, before that, to that of attorney general were highly criticized. Both the European Commission and the Group of States against Corruption (GRECO) have made recommendations to Spain to achieve greater independence of the Prosecutor's Office from the Government.