Category Archives: Spain

Suspected Caravaggio work given protected status in Spain

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Painting came close to being sold at auction for €1,500 before its true potential value of £50m came to light

A small oil painting that avoided being sold at a Spanish auction for €1,500 earlier this year after experts suggested it could be the work of the Italian master Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio has been granted protected status as an item of cultural interest.

The painting of the scourged Christ, which measures 111cm by 86cm, was withdrawn from sale in April after suspicions grew that it had been incorrectly attributed to the circle of the 17th-century Spanish artist José de Ribera.

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Draw deal: Spain’s El Gordo lottery hit by ticket vendor strike

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Annual multibillion-euro draw goes ahead despite Covid surge and first ever strike by lottery ticket sellers

Spain’s Christmas lottery, a lucrative and much-loved annual tradition that often ends in the joyous detonation of cava corks and the hatching of big plans, took place on Wednesday amid soaring Covid infections and the first ever strike by ticket vendors.

After the country recorded a record 49,823 new coronavirus cases on Tuesday night, many Spaniards welcomed the chance to focus instead on El Gordo (the Fat One) and its €2.4bn in prizes.

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‘A Francoist daydream’: how Spain’s right clings to its imperialist past

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A Peruvian author fears her adopted home is far from an apology for its Latin American abuses

The Plaza Mayor, where tourists gather to drink steep beers and feast on overpriced paella, may be better known. So may Puerta del Sol, where locals ring in the new year by eating a grape on each of the 12 chimes.

But Madrid’s Plaza de Colón, a 25-minute walk from these spaces, has come to play its own special part in the social, political and historical life of the capital – and the rest of Spain.

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Spanish scientists cautious as La Palma volcano quietens

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Experts have recorded no seismic activity from Cumbre Vieja volcano since Monday night

A volcano that has been spewing lava in the Canary Islands for almost three months has quietened but scientists warned the lull did not necessarily mean the eruption was over.

Experts recorded no seismic activity from the Cumbre Vieja volcano on La Palma island since Monday night, the Canary Islands’ volcanology institute tweeted.

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Catalonia row deepens over family’s push for Spanish in school

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Nationalists furious as court sides with family abused for seeking quarter of lessons in Spanish for their child

The long-running and bitter row over language teaching in Catalonia has intensified after a family in the Spanish region was harassed and abused for seeking to ensure that a quarter of the lessons at the school their five-year-old son attends are taught in Spanish.

The family’s actions have provoked an angry response from some Catalan nationalists who view their stance as an assault on the region’s language and culture.

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Spanish bishop who married ‘transgressive’ erotica author is stripped of powers

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Xavier Novell i Gomà was Spain’s youngest bishop before abandoning clerical career to marry Silvia Caballol

A controversial Spanish bishop has been formally stripped of his powers and prohibited from administering the sacraments four months after he abandoned his clerical career to marry a “dynamic and transgressive” erotic novelist.

Xavier Novell i Gomà, who became Spain’s youngest bishop aged just 41 when he was appointed to the Catalan municipality of Solsona in 2010, is reported to have backed and participated in so-called conversion therapies for gay people, and has also been criticised for supporting regional independence.

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Spanish village that dropped ‘Kill Jews’ name hit by antisemitic graffiti attack

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Castrillo Mota de Judíos’ Sephardic centre was among four locations defaced in the ‘cowardly’ attack

The mayor of a Spanish village whose former name was an ugly reminder of the country’s medieval persecution of its Jewish population has vowed to carry on with plans for a Sephardic memory centre despite an antisemitic graffiti attack this week.

Seven years ago, the 52 eligible residents of Castrillo Matajudíos – Camp Kill Jews in English, voted in a referendum to change the village’s name back to Castrillo Mota de Judíos, which means Jews’ Hill Camp.

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Travel firms scramble to rearrange holidays amid new Covid measures

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Swiss skiing holidays in doubt as country joins Spain in tightening travel rules to contain Omicron variant

Tour operators are scrambling to rearrange Swiss skiing holidays after the country joined Spain in tightening travel restrictions amid rising concerns about the spread of the new Omicron Covid variant.

From Saturday night, Switzerland mandated 10 days of quarantine for all new arrivals, in effect wrecking skiing holidays in the Swiss Alps until further notice. Travel firms are also wrestling with Spain’s ban on non-vaccinated arrivals that will affect British holidaymakers from Wednesday 1 December.

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The world is watching: TV hits around the globe

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A Spanish trans woman’s memoirs, a Mumbai gangster drama, Israeli sisters in trouble… the Covid era is a rich moment for TV drama. Critics from Spain to South Korea tell us about the biggest shows in their countries

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Podemos defends push to change Spain’s controversial ‘gag law’

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Leader calls legislation ‘greatest blow to civil and political liberties’ since return to democracy

The leader of Spain’s Podemos party has defended the coalition government’s push to change its predecessor’s “gag law”, calling it “the greatest blow to civil and political liberties” since the country’s return to democracy.

Ione Belarra, who serves as the minister for social rights in the Socialist-led minority government, said the public security legislation had eroded basic democratic rights since it was introduced by the conservative People’s party (PP) six years ago.

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Germany ‘at crossroads’ as Covid cases surge across Europe

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Urgent measures needed to avoid ‘chaos’, warns expert, as Spain, Portugal and Netherlands tighten rules

Germany’s top health officials have raised the prospect of a national lockdown, warning that a rapidly rising number of coronavirus cases and a dramatic increase in the number of patients in intensive care meant contact reduction was the only way of tackling the crisis and avoiding “the road to chaos”.

“We need a massive contact reduction immediately,” said Prof Lothar Wieler, the head of the Robert Koch Institute, Germany’s federal disease control agency.

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Spanish police recover rare 2,000-year-old Iberian sword

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Double-edged, curved falcata particularly sought after because of the original condition of its blade

More than 2,000 years after it was last wielded by a warrior somewhere on the Iberian peninsula, a rare, magnificent – and plundered – sword has been recovered by Spanish police, who tracked it down before it was sold online.

The pre-Roman falcata, a double-edged, curved sword used by the Iberians between the fifth and first centuries BC, was seized along with 202 other archaeological pieces after it appeared on what Policía Nacional officers termed “a well known social media site”.

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Pandemic hits mental health of women and young people hardest, survey finds

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Survey also finds adults aged 18-24 and women more concerned about personal finances than other groups

Young people and women have taken the hardest psychological and financial hit from the pandemic, a YouGov survey has found – but few people anywhere are considering changing their lives as a result of it.

The annual YouGov-Cambridge Globalism Project found that in many of the 27 countries surveyed, young people were consistently more likely than their elders to feel the Covid crisis had made their financial and mental health concerns worse.

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Support for populist sentiment falls across Europe, survey finds

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YouGov/Guardian poll finds ‘clear pattern of decreasing support for populism’ in European countries

Support for populist sentiment in Europe has fallen sharply over the past three years, according to a major YouGov survey, with markedly fewer people agreeing with key statements designed to measure it.

The YouGov-Cambridge Globalism Project’s annual populism tracker, produced with the Guardian, found populist beliefs in broadly sustained decline in 10 European countries, prompting its authors to suggest the wider electoral appeal of some may have peaked.

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‘A mirror of now’: the Valencian Nazis who inspired Óscar Aibar’s new film

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El sustituto based on ‘Germans from Dénia’ who sought refuge in Spain after the second world war

Óscar Aibar’s latest film, a thriller anchored in grotesque historical fact, owes its existence to a random holiday meal a decade or so ago.

The Spanish director was in Valencia for the summer when he looked up from his plate to study the pictures of famous people on the restaurant walls.

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Boris Johnson holiday villa linked to Zac Goldsmith firms accused of tax evasion

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Exclusive: Costa del Sol property firms owned by Goldsmith family ordered to pay €24m in unpaid taxes and fines

The luxury villa where Boris Johnson stayed on holiday last month is linked to Costa del Sol property businesses owned by Zac Goldsmith’s family that engaged in a multimillion-pound tax evasion scheme, according to Spanish courts.

Court papers obtained by the Guardian show tax inspectors ordered two property companies owned by the Goldsmith family to pay €24m (£20m) in unpaid taxes and fines after investigating what they said was a suspicious property deal.

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If health and education are essential services in Spain, why not housing? | Irene Baqué

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A renters’ movement in Catalonia is saving families from eviction and trying to fill the gap left by the state

Earlier this year, I found myself in the city of L’Hospitalet de Llobregat to the south-west of Barcelona. It lacks the fame and tourist hordes of the Catalan capital, but the two places are connected by the same dire housing crisis.

Guided by Júlia Nueno, organiser of a grassroots tenants’ movement, I found a community of neighbours in L’Hospitalet who hold their meetings in a public park yet are managing to take responsibility for something the authorities are failing at: putting a roof over people’s heads. Their challenge is daunting in a corner of Spain that still bears the scars of the 2008 economic crisis and remains in the grip of the Covid pandemic.

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Sindicat: evading eviction in one of Europe’s most densely populated cities – video

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Near Barcelona, L’Hospitalet de Llobregat is one of the most densely populated cities in the EU and home to a large migrant community. Dedicated to protecting the most vulnerable members of this fringe society, a group of young volunteers set up Sindicat, a renters union that is working relentlessly to counteract the housing crisis engulfing the often undocumented residents

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Sindicat: evading eviction in one of Europe’s most densely populated cities – Guardian documentary

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Near Barcelona, L’Hospitalet de Llobregat is one of the most densely populated cities in the EU and home to a large migrant community. Dedicated to protecting the most vulnerable members of this fringe society, a group of young volunteers set up Sindicat, a renters’ union that is working to counteract the housing crisis engulfing the often undocumented residents

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