Spain orders Franco's body be exhumed from mausoleum

Spain will exhume the body of dictator Francisco Franco to remove it from a state mausoleum seen by many as a monument to fascism, the Socialist government announced on Friday, in one of its last moves before a snap election due on April 28.

The plan to move divides opinion in a country conflicted about the dictatorship that ended with his death in 1975. The exhumation has been delayed several times, but the government said on Friday it would go ahead on June 10.

Franco will be taken from the Valley of the Fallen mausoleum to be reburied next to his wife, Carmen Polo, in the family tomb at Mingorrubio El Pardo, a state cemetery where various political figures are buried, in a ceremony without media coverage, Deputy Prime Minister Carmen Calvo said.

His family opposes the exhumation and has taken the issue to courts, but the Supreme Court has been silent so far.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-spain-politics-franco/spain-orders-francos-body-be-exhumed-from-mausoleum-idUSKCN1QW1QB