Spain Faces Up to Franco’s Anti-Gay Legacy
Gay.com UK,
December 17, 2004
By Keith McDonnell, Gay.com UK
LGBT campaigners in Spain have for many years been
fighting for the government to recognise the persecution that the majority of
Spain’s LGBT population suffered under Franco’s long years of
dictatorship.
On Wednesday the Spanish parliament formally recognised
the suffering that many thousands of gays endured under Gen Francisco Franco,
including being gaoled without trial and mass persecution.
The president of the parliament, Manuel Marin, read out a
statement saying that “the chamber recognises the suffering of homosexuals
during Franco’s years” offering them moral recognition and support. The
statement drew spontaneous and prolonged applause from deputies within the
chamber.
During Franco’s reign, which lasted from the end of
the Spanish Civil War in 1939 to his death in 1975, many lesbians and gay men
were gaoled in the country’s two “sexual re-education” centres and as
Marin pointed out—many were not released until 1979, two years after
Spain’s new government introduced a general amnesty.
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