The Spanish government will request the Constitutional Court to provisionally suspend the repeal of the Balearic Islands' memory law
Pedro Sánchez's executive will also file a constitutional appeal to argue that the repeal of regional regulations violates constitutional principles and international obligations undertaken by Spain in matters of human rights and justice.
PalmThe Spanish Government will request the Constitutional Court (TC) the provisional suspension of the repeal of the Balearic democratic memory law, to which the Parliament gave its approval on March 10 with the votes of the PP and Vox.
The decision, informed the Ministry of Territorial Policy and Democratic Memory in a statement, will be submitted to the next Council of Ministers, although it has not specified when. Thus, the state executive will file a lawsuit for unconstitutionality against the repeal of the regional Law of Democratic Memory and Recognition, which was approved in 2018. After the repeal was materialized, the minister in charge, Ángel Víctor Torres, urged the Prohens Government to meet to try to find an alternative. However, according to the Ministry, the Government "has declined" the proposal they made to them "for the full restitution of the law".
For this reason, as has already happened when other autonomous communities have repealed their respective memory laws, the Government has requested an opinion from the Council of State in order to file a lawsuit for unconstitutionality. The central Executive will also request the TC the provisional suspension of the law that repealed the democratic memory regulations while the judicial procedure is resolved, a measure that has previously been applied in similar cases.
The lawsuit will be based on the fact that the repeal of the regional regulations violates essential constitutional principles and the international obligations assumed by Spain in matters of human rights, truth, justice, reparation, and guarantees of non-repetition. The Ministry has defended that the elimination of this regulatory framework constitutes a "disregard" for the legal status of the victims of the Spanish Civil War and the Franco dictatorship. In its opinion, it directly affects rights linked to human dignity and moral integrity recognized in the Constitution.
Likewise, from Madrid they have recalled that the United Nations rapporteurs have warned about the risk that the so-called "concord" laws pose to the safeguarding of victims' rights. Among the aspects affected by the repeal are the policies for locating and identifying the disappeared, the signage of 'Places of Memory', educational and training programs on democratic memory, and the mechanisms for institutional collaboration and support for memorial associations. The Ministry, finally, has underlined that the repeal of the Balearic legislation compromises the legal obligations of the State Law on Democratic Memory, which applies throughout the territory and establishes a duty of collaboration among all public administrations to guarantee victims' rights.