#falange

#falange

The Basque government has made the transfer of Picasso's painting a matter of regional pride, viewing it as a gesture of historical remembrance and symbolic reparation toward the Basque people.

The board, which had echoes of Ireland's notorious Magdalene laundries, was overseen by Carmen Polo, the wife of the dictator Gen Francisco Franco. Originally founded in 1902 to stamp out sex work, in 1941, two years after the end of the Spanish civil war, its role was extended to clamp down on female behaviour that deviated from norms laid down by the Catholic church.

Photographs of Tejero wearing the tricorn patent leather hat of the Guardia Civil and brandishing a pistol at MPs on 23 February 1981 are among the most indelible images of Spain's young democracy.

I lived in Argentina in the mid-1980s, just after the fall of the brutal military dictatorship that ruled from 1976 to 1983. The country was taking its first, shaky steps back toward democracy. It was a time of great hope, but also of grave uncertainty - because while the generals were gone, the political culture that enabled them remained. Like most of the nation, I was captivated by the pioneering trials of the military generals that promised to restore justice.

In the future world, America, with its energy and vitality, must play a leading role,