A plaque in the old prison of Tarragona remembers its relevance during the Franco regime

The Generalitat and the Tarragona City Council have placed a commemorative plaque on the façade of the old provincial prison of Tarragona to remember the relevance of the space during the Franco regime.

The facility was inaugurated in 1953, was built by Republican prisoners and was active until November 2015.

The installation of the sign coincides with the commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the executions of Salvador Puig Antich in the Modelo prison in Barcelona and that of the German Heinz Ches, on the same day and at the same time, in Tarragona.

The Minister of Democratic Memory of the Tarragona City Council, Sandra Ramos, has pointed out that in the coming months more similar plaques will be placed in other parts of the city.

Ramos has asked that “the name of all the people who were victims of Franco’s regime not be lost” and has vindicated the public policies that are behind democratic memory.

“We have a moral obligation to continue doing this work. In other autonomous communities on our side they have eradicated democratic memory policies,” he said, referring to the Aragonese, Balearic and Valencian governments, of which he stated that they are not interested in “conserving -the and disseminate it”.

For all this, he has stated that “democratic memory is not something from the past”, but rather it is about raising awareness and vindicating the lives of people “who have been marked by a history that is one of justice that the public powers” vindicate. .

For her part, the director of the Territorial Services of Justice, Rights and Memory in Tarragona, Virgínia Martínez, has affirmed that “the plaque wants to claim one of the most important aspects of recent memory such as the crimes and atrocities of the Francoist repression “.

Martínez has indicated that they want to continue promoting the work of opening the prison to the citizens “and recounting dark moments in recent history.”

Finally, Josep Font, from the Network of Democratic Memory Spaces, explained that the network began its journey in 2009 and currently has 175 spaces throughout Catalonia. “The signage is the latest result of documentation work,” he said.