Hundreds of people, mostly women, condemned during witch-hunts that persisted well into 18th century
The Catalan parliament is on Wednesday expected to pass a resolution to pardon up to 1,000 people – the majority of them women – condemned for the crime of witchcraft in the region 400 years ago.
The move follows similar gestures in Scotland, Switzerland and Norway after more than 100 European historians signed a manifesto titled: They weren’t witches, they were women.
Continue reading...Many EU countries opt to reopen despite record infections as WHO suggests Omicron may signal more manageable phase of pandemic
The Netherlands has lifted its toughest Covid controls, Denmark is to remove all restrictions within days and France will begin easing curbs next week, as many – but not all – EU countries opt to reopen despite record infection numbers.
The moves come as data shows hospital and intensive care admissions are not surging in line with cases, and after the World Health Organization suggested the Omicron variant – which studies show is more contagious but usually less severe for vaccinated people – may signal a new, more manageable phase in the pandemic.
Continue reading...Thirty years after his death, the rich life of the Spanish Gypsy singer is depicted through 10 illustrated episodes
In death, as in life, the legendary flamenco singer Camarón de la Isla continues to confound expectations, cross borders and demand that his blistered and blistering voice be heard.
The revered, beloved and sometimes controversial cantaor died of lung cancer in July 1992, aged just 41. But as the 30th anniversary of his death looms, the singer born José Monge Cruz is being reincarnated in the black-and-white pages of a new graphic novel intended as a homage to Camarón, the music he created and the comic book itself.
Continue reading...The Spanish festival of Las Luminarias has been held for the first time since the start of the Covid-19 pandemic
Continue reading...In recent days many evacuees have come home, as the island scrambles to find a use for the spewed matter
For three months they were subject to whims of a roaring volcano. Now residents on the small Spanish island of La Palma are wrestling with another dilemma: what do with the millions of cubic metres of lava and ash it left behind.
The volcano rumbled for 85 days, ejecting ash and rivers of lava that swallowed more than 1,000 homes, cut off highways and suffocated the lush banana plantations that drive the island’s economy.
Continue reading...More than two thirds of Poland’s Covid-19 medical advisory body resigns; restrictions in the Netherlands will be eased from Saturday
South Korea will extend tougher social distancing rules for three more weeks amid concerns over a looming Omicron wave ahead of the Lunar New Year holidays, officials said on Friday.
The curbs were restored a month ago just six weeks after being eased under a “living with Covid-19” scheme, as record-breaking numbers of new cases and critically ill patients threatened to saturate the country’s medical system.
Continue reading...The ‘exceptional find’ was discovered only feet from a badger’s den in the northern region of Asturias
A trove of 209 Roman coins in a cave in northern Spain – hailed by researchers as an “exceptional find” – is believed to have been uncovered by a badger desperately foraging for food.
The coins, dating from between the third and fifth century AD, were spotted in a cave in the municipality of Grado in the northern region of Asturias. They were found mere feet from the den of a badger, months after Storm Filomena dumped heavy snow across swaths of the country.
Continue reading...Convicted murderer Gioacchino Gammino tracked down in Galapagar, near Madrid, where he had lived undetected for 20 years
An Italian mafia boss on the run for 20 years was tracked down to a Spanish town after being spotted on Google Maps.
Gioacchino Gammino, a convicted murderer listed among Italy’s most wanted gangsters, was arrested in Galapagar, a town near Madrid, where over the years he had married, changed his name to Manuel, worked as a chef and owned a fruit and vegetable shop.
Continue reading...Support for España Vaciada in villages such as Milmarcos could threaten the old ruling duopoly
Judith Iturbe grimaces as she thinks about August and what it means for the residents and rhythms of Milmarcos.
At the height of summer, the population of this small and beautiful Spanish village, which sits close to Castilla-La Mancha’s border with Aragón, rises from just 44 to about 1,000.
Continue reading...Analysis: Amid a backlash in England over the rule change, we look at the rules in place in other countries
The return of a requirement in England for secondary pupils to wear face masks in class has sparked a backlash at the start of the new term, but several EU countries have already adopted the measure even for primary school children.
Some Conservative MPs and parents’ groups have objected to the move, warning of a long-term impact of masks on children’s mental health and arguing that they they will have a longer-term effect on people’s ability to learn and socialise.
Continue reading...Residents of Pontedeume form patrol after brushes with man they suspect is escaped murder convict Alfredo Sánchez Chacón
Residents of a town in north-west Spain have banded together to try to track down a convicted murderer – nicknamed the “Galician Rambo” for his multiple jailbreaks and extensive knowledge of survival techniques – who is believed to be living in a nearby wooded area.
Alfredo Sánchez Chacón has been on the run since March when he failed to return to prison after being allowed out on a day pass. News that the 63-year-old was missing probably surprised few: Sánchez Chacón, who is due to be in prison until 2025 for a murder in 1996, was already notorious across Spain for slipping out of prison twice.
Continue reading...Statistics on gender-based violence broadened beyond cases involving partners or exes
Official statistics on gender-based violence in Spain will be broadened to include killings of women and children by men regardless of whether there was a prior relationship between victim and killer, in what is being described as a first in Europe.
“What is not named does not exist,” said Spain’s equality minister, Irene Montero. “We have to recognise all of the victims and make visible all forms of violence – all machista [sexist] killings – so that we can put in place policies for prevention, early detection and eradication.”
Continue reading...Records broken in Bilbao and Segovia, and avalanche warnings in Alps where it is too warm even for fake snow
Spain registered record-breaking temperatures this week and areas of the Italian Alps are forecast to reach up to 15C above the seasonal average in the coming days as much of Europe experiences an anomalously warm start to the new year.
In Bilbao, northern Spain, temperatures hit 24.7C, a high not seen since record-keeping began in 1947. In Segovia, near Madrid, 22.7C was recorded, the highest since 1920, and nearby Avila reached 20.2C, its highest since 1983.
Continue reading...Handful of local administrations are among the first in west to offer arrangement to their employees
A handful of local administrations in Spain have become among the first in western Europe to offer menstrual leave to their employees, in an attempt to strike a better balance between workplace demands and period pains.
This year the Catalan city of Girona became the first in the country to consider flexible working arrangements for any employee experiencing discomfort due to periods. In June it announced a deal with its more than 1,300 municipal employees to allow women, trans men and non-binary individuals to take up to eight hours menstrual leave a month, with the caveat that any time used must be recovered within a span of three months.
Continue reading...French officials report over 206,000 cases; number of people to die from Covid in eastern Europe has reached 1 million people
Here’s a reminder of the news overnight that NHS England is looking to set up new “pop-up” Covid facilities. My colleagues Rowena Mason and Aubrey Allegretti report:
NHS England confirmed that it was creating new small-scale “Nightingale” facilities with up to 100 beds each at eight hospitals across the country. The health service said it had asked trusts to identify empty spaces to accommodate beds in places such as gyms or teaching areas. NHS managers are aiming to create up to 4,000 beds as surge capacity if needed, with work on the first tranche, in temporary structures, starting this week.
Continue reading...Dictator who died in 1975 stamped out mention of Spanish civil war, sexuality and anti-Catholic views
A Spanish association has called for an investigation into the enduring legacy of censorship during the Franco regime after it emerged that censored versions of books and films are still circulating more than four decades after the dictator died.
Emilio Silva, the president of Spain’s Association for the Recovery of Historical Memory, sounded the alarm earlier this week after he stumbled upon a different version of the 1946 film It’s a Wonderful Life on television.
Continue reading...Paperwork and Covid culminate in another year of headaches for food and wine producers
For more than two decades, Unexport has shipped millions of kilograms of produce annually from farms in the southern Spanish region of Murcia to clients in the UK. Brexit has transformed the relatively straightforward process into a bureaucratic nightmare, yielding border waiting times of up to 10 hours for lorries laden with lemons and lettuce, said Domingo Llamas, its president.
Given the damage already inflicted by the UK’s exit from the bloc, plus the coronavirus pandemic, he sees the final implementation of thrice-delayed checks as just “one other thing” to manage.
Continue reading...During the annual Els Enfarinats battle in the south-eastern Spanish town of Ibi participants dress in military clothes and stage a mock coup d’etat as they battle using flour, eggs and firecrackers outside the town hall. The 200-year-old tradition is part of the Day of the Holy Innocents celebrations, a time in Spain for pulling pranks
Continue reading...Spanish officials hail ‘historic’ deal to limit arrivals to maximum of three vessels a day at Mallorca port
Officials in the Balearic Islands will seek to limit cruise ships to a maximum of three vessels a day at its largest port, in a deal described as the first of its kind in Spain.
The regional government said in a statement that arrivals at Palma in Mallorca would be limited when possible to three cruise ships a day, one of the vessels allowed to be a mega-cruise liner carrying more than 5,000 people, starting in 2022.
Continue reading...After volcanic eruptions and tourism woes, island gets some Christmas cheer as tickets scoop €400,000
After grappling with volcanic eruptions that dragged on for three months, piling on to the tourism woes brought by the coronavirus pandemic, a bit of luck has landed in the Canary Island of La Palma.
Spain’s Christmas lottery – the two-century-old tradition that on Wednesday showered €2.4bn in prize money across the country – included a nugget of good news for the hard-hit island as two local kiosks said they had sold winning tickets worth a total of €400,000.
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