Alex Trelinski
AROUND a hundred people could be fined following a Madrid gathering on Sunday commemorating the anniversary of the 1975 death of dictator General Francisco Franco.
The open-air meeting was approved but under Spain’s new Democratic Memory law, participants cannot shout, sing, or make approving gestures that extol Franco and his associates.
Videos and photos showed fascist salutes and vocal celebrations of Franco and Falangist group founder, Jose Antonio Primo de Rivera in the capital’s Plaza de Oriente.
Law breakers could in theory be penalised with fines of up to €150,000.
Government sources told the El Pais newspaper that the ‘Government will take action against the people and organisations’ that were involved in the ceremony.
Authorities are looking at videos and other evidence ahead of imposing sanctions.
A government spokesperson said: “Today’s Spain is based on our Constitution and on the democratic values ??that guarantees coexistence in freedom and rejects, like other European countries, any exaltation of an authoritarian regime or its main figures.”
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