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The Universite Libre de Bruxelles handed out an honorary degree on 16 November to an investigation judge at the Spanish Audiencia Nacional. Despite Spain’s overall denials, this court is, at the core, an exclusive court, tailor made for Basque activists.

The Audiencia Nacional is part of the heritage of the Franco-regime. Garzón, who euphemistically said is not reluctant to publicity, is the mediagenic number one of the Spanish exception court. The deeds of Garzón, who inspired the Universite Libre de Bruxelles to make this choice, are the investigative judge’s struggle for human rights, the battle against terrorism, the prosecution of former dictator Pinochet and his efforts for the International Criminal Court. For me in particular his services for the Spanish state are known. He is the spiritual father, the motor, of the hunt on Basques. He has set the criminalisation of the Basque movement for autonomy in motion.

By criminalisation I mean that Garzón puts everything in one big pile, he puts those who have committed no form of violence whatsoever in line with those who commit political violence. He is at the service of the executive powers, the successive Spanish governments. They fight against the Basque autonomists on various levels, the military, the police level, the political level, the media level and, in the end, the juridical battleground.

In late 1997 I was an observer and human rights defender at the trial of the Basque nationalist party Herri Batasuna. Garzón and his crew brought 23 members of the board of this party to the court in Madrid. Legally chosen representatives, lawyers, professors, journalists, trade union people, workers, civil servants, an average company of this popular movement sat in the dock. None of the suspects had committed an act of violence, carried weapons or used weapons, let alone commit attacks. Their crime was the distribution of a video during the election campaign. In this video, armed members of ETA talked about a peace proposal.

The trial was a farce. It looked like a Stalinist show trial from the late thirties in the Soviet Union. The separation-wall of the executive powers and the juridical power was in my eyes if not paper-thin, non-existing. The spirit of Franco wandered strongly through the courtroom.

The court gave 7 years-effective jail time for all members, even for those who never participated in the decision to distribute the video. They were all put behind bars immediately. In 1997 more than 20 people went to prison because of a crime of opinion, or what. Immediately everyone was put behind bars. A jewel in the crown of the celebrated investigative judge.

Two years later the Constitutional Court destroyed this ruling out of honest shame, a constitution unworthy. Immediately everybody was released. Innocent as they were, they were robbed of their freedom for two years with the result that people lost their jobs, families and people broken, the backbone of a movement was hit. A kind of comfort for the prosecutors.

Not intimidated by this backlash, Garzón went on with grimness. He succeeded in beating Herri Batasuna, not by elections as is the way in a parliamentary democracy, but simply by banning the party. In a next battle he attacked support comities of political prisoners, anti-torture movements, Basque youth organisations, spokespeople outside Spain, lawyers of Basque activists. During more than 20 years these organisations worked legally without any suspicion and in the open. The judge rewarded their openness with prosecution. He opened a file with all documents these organisation made public for the last 20 years. Yesterday, 21 November, the mega-trial against 59 Basque citizens started. Their crime is their political conviction. The charge is their opinion. None of them used violence, carried weapons or carried out attacks.

The fresh doctor honoris causa is also active beyond the Spanish borders. Some years ago a Belgian court decided not to extradite the Basque couple Moreno-Garcia to Spain. Twelve years later, after the newly implemented European arrest warrant, Spain asked for the extradition again. Twelve members of the courts of appeal of Brussels and Antwerp refused extradition. The Duke of Alba seemed to have risen from his grave when Garzón responded furiously on this decision. In an interview with a Flemish newspaper of 15 March 2005, given because of the publication of his book, Garzón attacks the Belgian judges. He reproaches them ignorance and neglecting the elementary rules of law. It is legally and deontologically forbidden for a judge to name suspects in the media and attack them. It is also inadmissible that a judge criticises colleagues because of their judgements. It only confirms my belief that Spain is not, by far a full-grown constitutional state.

Finally, the Spanish magistrates and Garzón specifically, can learn a lot from the independence and integrity of the Belgian constitutional powers and their deep feeling for justice, which is based on a 175 year old constitutional state and not a 25 year old one. Recently UN-rapporteur Theo van Boven published a report about torture in Spain. His findings were very incriminating. From the side of the otherwise so talkative investigative judge Garzón, honoured as a fighter for human rights, the silence was thundering. The limit of his concerns for the basic rights is clearly to be found at the borders of Spain.

The Universite Libre de Bruxelles gave a wrong signal with this honorary doctorate. Its gesture only encourages those who threw away the child of democracy with the bath-water of security. You are honoured with those who you honour.

Published in: De Morgen, 22 November 2005