The Spanish 1977 Amnesty Law is a law promulgated by the

Parliament of Spain The Cortes Generales (; en, Spanish Parliament, lit=General Courts) are the bicameral legislative chambers of Spain, consisting of the Congress of Deputies (the lower house), and the Senate (the upper house). The Congress of Deputies meets i ...

in 1977, two years after

caudillo A ''caudillo'' ( , ; osp, cabdillo, from Latin , diminutive of ''caput'' "head") is a type of personalist leader wielding military and political power. There is no precise definition of ''caudillo'', which is often used interchangeably with " ...

Francisco Franco's death.Ackar, Kadribasic (2010
Transitional Justice in Democratization Processes: The Case of Spain from an International Point of View
''International Journal of Rule of Law, Transitional Justice and Human Rights'', pp. 132–133. The law freed

political prisoners A political prisoner is someone imprisoned for their political activity. The political offense is not always the official reason for the prisoner's detention. There is no internationally recognized legal definition of the concept, although nu ...

and permitted those exiled to return to Spain, but also guaranteed impunity for those who participated in crimes, during the

Civil War A civil war or intrastate war is a war between organized groups within the same state (or country). The aim of one side may be to take control of the country or a region, to achieve independence for a region, or to change government policies ...

, and in

Francoist Spain Francoist Spain ( es, España franquista), or the Francoist dictatorship (), was the period of Spanish history between 1939 and 1975, when Francisco Franco ruled Spain after the Spanish Civil War with the title . After his death in 1975, Spai ...

. The law is still in force, and has been used as a reason for not investigating and prosecuting Francoist

human rights violations Human rights are moral principles or normsJames Nickel, with assistance from Thomas Pogge, M.B.E. Smith, and Leif Wenar, 13 December 2013, Stanford Encyclopedia of PhilosophyHuman Rights Retrieved 14 August 2014 for certain standards of hum ...

.Paloma Aguilar, "The Timing and the Scope of Reparation, Truth and Justice Measures: A Comparison of the Spanish, Argentinian and Chilean Cases" i
''Building a Future on Peace and Justice: Studies on Transitional Justice''
(eds.

Kai Ambos Kai Ambos (born 29 March 1965) is a German jurist and judge. He who holds the teaching chair at the University of Göttingen in criminal law, criminal procedure, comparative law and international criminal law. He served as a judge at the Dis ...

, Judith Large, and Marieke Wierda: Springer, 2009), pp. 505, 521–522. The act institutionalized Spain's " pact of forgetting"—a decision among Spanish parties and political actors, during and after the Spanish transition to democracy, not to address atrocities committed by the Spanish State. The 1977 amnesty has been criticized by scholars for equating "victims and victimizers" and for shielding human rights violators from prosecution and punishment. Spain has argued that perpetrators of crimes against humanity cannot be prosecuted for crimes committed before 1939; however, the UN takes the view that the Francoist era crimes should be investigated.''La ONU da la razón a Garzón y pide investigar el franquismo''
'' Público'' (Publico.es), 10/02/2012 In February 2012, the

United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, commonly known as the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) or the United Nations Human Rights Office, is a department of the Secretariat of the United Nati ...

demanded the 1977 Amnesty Law to be repealed, on the basis that it violates

international human rights law International human rights law (IHRL) is the body of international law designed to promote human rights on social, regional, and domestic levels. As a form of international law, international human rights law are primarily made up of treaties, a ...

. The Commissioner referred to Spain's obligation to comply with the

International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) is a multilateral treaty that commits nations to respect the civil and political rights of individuals, including the right to life, freedom of religion, freedom of speech, fr ...

. Under international human rights law, there is no

statute of limitations A statute of limitations, known in civil law systems as a prescriptive period, is a law passed by a legislative body to set the maximum time after an event within which legal proceedings may be initiated. ("Time for commencing proceedings") In ...

for crimes against humanity.Spain must lift amnesty for Franco era crimes – U.N.
Reuters (February 10, 2012). In 2013, a UN working group of experts again called upon Spain to repeal the 1977 law.U.N. tells Spain to revoke Franco-era amnesty law
Reuters (September 30, 2013). In 2008, Judge

Baltasar Garzón Baltasar Garzón Real (; born 26 October 1955) is a former Spanish judge. Garzón formerly served on Spain's central criminal court, the ''Audiencia Nacional'', and was the examining magistrate of the ''Juzgado Central de Instrucción No. 5'', ...

briefly began an official inquiry, symbolically indicting Franco for the disappearance of more than 100,000 people. In 2009, Manos Limpias, a far-right syndicate, brought criminal charges against the judge, for defying the amnesty law. Garzón was acquitted of the charges of "knowingly acting without jurisdiction", relating to his investigation of Francoist crimes, but was then disbarred for 11 years by the

Spanish Supreme Court The Supreme Court ('', TS'') is the highest court in the Kingdom of Spain. Originally established pursuant to Title V of the Constitution of 1812 to replace —in all matters that affected justice— the System of Councils, and currently regula ...

in 2012, on an unrelated charge. Sarah Leggott, ''Memory, War, and Dictatorship in Recent Spanish Fiction by Women'' (Bucknell University Press, 2015), p. 20.

Argentinian Argentines (mistakenly translated Argentineans in the past; in Spanish ( masculine) or ( feminine)) are people identified with the country of Argentina. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Argentines, ...

judge María Cubrini de Servía has been investigating civil rights abuses under the Franco regime, since 2010. In 2018, she agreed to extend her investigation to include crimes specifically against women.Guardian Oct 26, 2018, Judge investigates Franco era crimes
/ref>

References

{{Reflist 1977 in Spain 1977 in law Amnesty laws Crimes against humanity Francoist Spain Law of Spain Spanish transition to democracy