View source for Human rights in Spain

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{{PoliticsES}}
'''Human rights in Spain''' are set out in the [[Spanish Constitution of 1978|1978 Spanish constitution]]. Sections 6 and 7 guarantees the right to create and operate political parties and trade unions so long as they respect the Constitution and the law.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.congreso.es/portal/page/portal/Congreso/Congreso/Hist_Normas/Norm/const_espa_texto_ingles_0.pdf |title=Constitution| access-date=13 November 2017}}</ref>

==Healthcare for illegal immigrants==
{{See also|European migrant crisis#Spain}}
Until 2012, universal healthcare was guaranteed to all universal immigrants regardless of the administrative status. There was an attempt to change this situation under a new health law introduced in September 2012, whereby immigrants or expatriates without proper residents permits were to be refused medical care. Illegal immigrants would only be entitled to free treatment within [[Health care in Spain|Spain's healthcare system]] in cases of emergency or a pregnancy or birth.<ref name="The Guardian1">{{cite web|title=Immigrants in Spain to lose right to public healthcare|url=https://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/aug/31/immigrants-spain-lose-public-healthcare|website=Theguardian.com|date=31 August 2012 |access-date=9 October 2014}}</ref> This law was rejected and not applied by a majority of regions of Spain, which have ensured universal coverage to illegal immigrants.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.abc.es/sociedad/20150826/abci-asistencia-sanitaria-comunidades-201508251319.html|title=Así es la asistencia sanitaria a los 'sin papeles' según la comunidad en la que residan|website=Abc.es|date=26 August 2015 |access-date=22 June 2018}}</ref>

== Roma ==
{{Summarize|date=June 2018}}
{{Unfocused|date=February 2020}}
{{Main|Environmental racism in Europe#Spain}}
[[File:NASA photo of plasticulture, Campo de Dalías, Spain.jpg|thumb|NASA view of greenhouses at El Ejido on the Campo de Dalías, Spain.]]
[[Environmental racism]] has been documented in [[Spain]], with [[North Africa]]n and Romani ethnic communities being particularly affected, as well as [[Migrant worker|migrant]] agricultural workers from throughout [[Africa]], [[Asia]], [[Latin America]], and [[Southeast Europe]]. As of 2007, there were an estimated 750,000 Romani (primarily [[Gitanos|Gitano]] Romani) living in Spain.<ref name="Fact sheet">{{cite web|url=http://presenciagitana.org/The_situation_of_Roma_in_Spain_06012016.pdf|author1=European Roma|author2=Travellers Forum|title=Fact sheet on the situation of Roma in Spain|publisher=European Roma and Travellers Forum|date=January 2016|pages=1–15|access-date=July 10, 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170702054943/http://presenciagitana.org/The_situation_of_Roma_in_Spain_06012016.pdf|archive-date=July 2, 2017}}</ref>{{rp|3}} According to the "Housing Map of the Roma Community in Spain, 2007", 12% of Romani live in substandard housing, while 4%, or 30,000 people, live in slums or shantytowns; furthermore, 12% resided in segregated settlements.<ref name="Fact sheet"/>{{rp|8}} According to the Roma Inclusion Index 2015, the denial of environmental benefits has been documented in some communities, with 4% of Romani in Spain not having access to running water, and 9% not having access to electricity.<ref name="Fact sheet"/>{{rp|8}}

Efforts to relocate shantytowns (''chabolas''), which according to a 2009 report by the [[EU Agency for Fundamental Rights]] were disproportionately inhabited by Romani persons,<ref name=Ostalinda>{{cite web|author=Ostalinda Ovalle |author2=Tatjana Peric |title=Case study: improving Roma housing and eliminating slums, Spain |publisher=European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights|date=October 2009 |access-date=July 10, 2016|url=https://fra.europa.eu/sites/default/files/fra_uploads/605-090210-ROMA_Housing_Case-final-ENES.pdf}}</ref>{{rp|4}} gained momentum in the late 1980s and 1990s.<ref name="Situation">{{cite web|url=http://miris.eurac.edu/mugs2/do/blob.pdf?type=pdf&serial=1038307564216|author=Open Society Institute|title=The Situation of Roma in Spain|work=Minority Rights Information System|publisher=EU Accession Monitoring Program|year=2002|pages=281–359|access-date=June 24, 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170625062640/http://miris.eurac.edu/mugs2/do/blob.pdf?type=pdf&serial=1038307564216|archive-date=June 25, 2017}}</ref>{{rp|315}} These initiatives were ostensibly designed to improve Romani living conditions, yet also had the purpose of being employed to vacate plots of real estate for development.<ref name="Situation"/>{{rp|315}} In the words of a 2002 report on the situation of Romani in Spain, "thousands of Roma live in transitional housing, without any indication of when the transition period will end," a situation which has been attributed to the degradation of many transitional housing projects into ghettoes.<ref name="Situation"/>{{rp|316}} In the case of many such relocations, Romani people have been moved to the peripheries of urban centers,<ref name="Situation"/>{{rp|315, 317}} often in environmentally problematic areas.<ref name="Situation"/>{{rp|316}} In the case of Cañada Real Galiana, diverse ethnic groups including non-Romani Spaniards and [[Moroccans]] have been documented as experiencing issues of environmental injustice alongside Romani communities.<ref name=Gonick/>{{rp|16}}<ref name="Rubio">Rubio, Lucía Asué Mbomío. "[http://www.antropodocs.com/dossier/Dossier-The-Invisible-City-English.pdf The Invisible City: Voices in the Cañada Real Galiana]" (film dossier). {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170221013038/http://www.antropodocs.com/dossier/Dossier-The-Invisible-City-English.pdf |date=February 21, 2017}} ''Docs & Films, Catalogo de Distribución''. Antropodocus Producciones, 2015. Web. p. 10–15. July 8, 2016.</ref>{{rp| 13–15}}

In 2002, 16 Romani families in El Cascayu were relocated under a transitional housing scheme to what has been described by the organization SOS Racismo as a discriminatory, isolated, and environmentally marginalized housing location.<ref name="Situation"/>{{rp|317}} According to SOS Racismo,

<blockquote>... the last housing units built within [the] eradication of marginalization plan in El Cascayu, where 16 families will be re-housed, is a way of chasing these families out of the city. They will live in a place surrounded by a 'sewer river,' a railroad trail, an industrial park and a highway. So far away from education centres, shops, recreational places and without public transport, it will be physically difficult for them to get out of there.<ref name="Situation"/>{{rp|317}}</blockquote>

[[File:Canada Real Galiana, Madrid.jpg|thumb|Map excerpt of Valdemingómez district, Cañada Real Galiana, Madrid. The long grey strip along Cañada Real Galiana roadway and transhumance trail denotes the 16 kilometre-long, 75 metre-wide shantytown where 8,600 persons reside. Rectangular shapes denote structures.]]
On the outskirts of [[Madrid]], 8,600 persons inhabit the informal settlement of [[Cañada Real|Cañada Real Galiana]],<ref name=Gonick>{{cite journal|author=Gonick, Sophie|title=Interrogating Madrid's 'Slum of Shame': Urban Expansion, Race, and Place-Based Activisms in the Cañada Real Galiana|journal=Antipode|volume=47|number=5|year=2015|issn=0066-4812|pages=1–19|doi=10.1111/anti.12156}}</ref>{{rp|16}} also known as La Cañada Real Riojana or La Cañada Real de las merinas.<ref name=Rubio/>{{rp|10}} It constitutes the largest shantytown in Western Europe.<ref name=Gonick/>{{rp|1}} The settlement is located along 16 kilometres of a 75-metre-wide, 400 kilometre-long environmentally protected [[transhumance]] trail between [[Getafe]] and [[Coslada]],<ref name=Gonick/>{{rp|2–3}}<ref name=Rubio/>{{rp|10}} part of a 125,000 kilometre network of transhumance routes throughout Spain.<ref name=Rubio/>{{rp|10}} Certain areas of the unplanned and unauthorized settlement are economically affluent, working-class, or middle-class<ref name=Gonick/>{{rp|3}}<ref name=Rubio/>{{rp|12}} and are viewed as desirable areas for many (particularly Moroccan immigrants who have faced discrimination in the broader Spanish rental market).<ref name=Gonick/>{{rp|9}}<ref name=Rubio/>{{rp|12}} However, much of the Cañada Real Galiana is subject to severe environmental racism,<ref name=Gonick/>{{rp|8}} particularly in the Valdemingómez district of the settlement.<ref name=Rubio/>{{rp|13–16}}

=== Migrant agricultural workers in Southern Spain ===
{{See also|Murcia#Economy|Intensive farming in Almería|Province of Huelva#Agriculture}}
Throughout southern Spain, migrant workers from Africa, Asia, Latin America, and South East Europe employed in the agricultural sector have experienced housing and labour conditions that could be defined as environmental racism, producing food for larger European society while facing extreme deprivations.<ref name="Serpis">{{cite web|author=Serpis, Almudena|title=Salad days? Semi-slavery on the 'sweating fields' of southern Spain|work=The Ecologist|date=April 16, 2015|access-date=July 10, 2016|url=http://www.theecologist.org/News/news_analysis/2832894/salad_days_semislavery_on_the_sweating_fields_of_southern_spain.html|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161006041135/http://www.theecologist.org/News/news_analysis/2832894/salad_days_semislavery_on_the_sweating_fields_of_southern_spain.html|archive-date=October 6, 2016}}</ref><ref name="Kennedy">{{cite web|author=Kennedy, Siobhan|title=What's the real cost of your fresh salad?|work=4 News|date=April 15, 2016|access-date=July 10, 2016|url=http://www.channel4.com/news/salad-supermarkets-cost-migrant-exploitation-pay-pesticide|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170718142937/https://www.channel4.com/news/salad-supermarkets-cost-migrant-exploitation-pay-pesticide|archive-date=July 18, 2017}}</ref><ref name="Wockner">{{cite web|author=Wockner, Gary|title=Europe's Dirty Little Secret: Moroccan Slaves and a 'Sea of Plastic'|work=EcoWatch|date=December 18, 2015|access-date=July 10, 2016|url=http://www.ecowatch.com/europes-dirty-little-secret-moroccan-slaves-and-a-sea-of-plastic-1882131257.html|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170427011733/https://www.ecowatch.com/europes-dirty-little-secret-moroccan-slaves-and-a-sea-of-plastic-1882131257.html|archive-date=April 27, 2017}}</ref>

In [[Murcia]], lettuce pickers have complained of having to illegally work for salary by volume for employment agencies, instead of by the hour, meaning they are required to work more hours for less pay, while also experiencing unsafe exposure to pesticides.<ref name="Kennedy" /> Workers have alleged that they have been forced to work in fields while pesticide spraying is active, a practice which is illegal under Spanish work safety laws.<ref name="Serpis" /><ref name="Kennedy" />

Beginning in the 2000s in the [[El Ejido]] region of [[Andalusia]], African (including large numbers of Moroccan) immigrant greenhouse workers have been documented as being faced with severe social marginalization and racism while simultaneously being exposed to extremely difficult working conditions with significant exposure to toxic pesticides.<ref name="Kennedy" /><ref name="Wockner" /> The El Ejido region has been described by environmentalists as a "sea of plastic" due to the expansive swaths of land covered by greenhouses, and has also been labeled "Europe's dirty little secret" due to the documented abuses of workers who help produce large quantities of Europe's food supply.<ref name="Wockner" />[[File:El Ejido aerial.jpg|thumb|Greenhouses at El Ejido]]In these greenhouses, workers are allegedly required to work under "slave-like" conditions in temperatures as high as 50 degrees Celsius with nonexistent ventilation, while being denied basic rest facilities and earning extremely low wages, among other workplace abuses.<ref name=Serpis/><ref name=Kennedy/> As of 2015, out of 120,000 immigrant workers employed in the greenhouses, 80,000 are undocumented and not protected by Spanish labour legislation, according to Spitou Mendy of the Spanish Field Workers Syndicate (SOC).<ref name=Serpis/> Workers have complained of ill health effects as a result of exposure to pesticides without proper protective equipment.<ref name=Serpis/><ref name=Kennedy/>
{{Split section|Racism in Spain|date=February 2020}}
Following the killing of two Spanish farmers and a Spanish woman in two separate incidents involving Moroccan citizens in February 2000, an outbreak of xenophobic violence took place in and around El Ejido, injuring 40 and displacing large numbers of immigrants.<ref>EFE. [http://www.lavanguardia.com/vida/20031021/51262782855/mas-de-11-de-anos-de-prision-por-el-crimen-que-desencadeno-los-incidentes-racistas-en-el-ejido.html Más de 11 de años de prisión por el crimen que desencadenó los incidentes racistas en El Ejido]. La Vanguardia, ''EFE''. October 21, 2003. Web. n. pag. Retrieved July 23, 2017.</ref><ref name="Angel Lluch">{{cite web|author=Angel Lluch, Victor|title=The pogrom at El Ejido: Spanish apartheid, plastic-wrapped|work=Le Monde diplomatique|date=March 2000|access-date=July 10, 2016|url=http://mondediplo.com/2000/03/11spain|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170729075516/http://mondediplo.com/2000/03/11spain|archive-date=July 29, 2017}}</ref> According to Angel Lluch<blockquote>For three days on end, from 5 to 7 February, racist violence swept the town with immigrants as its target. For 72 hours hordes of farmers wielding iron bars, joined by youths from the high schools, beat up their victims, chased them through the streets and pursued them out among the greenhouses. Roads were blocked, barricaded and set aflame.<ref name="Angel Lluch" /></blockquote>

In the strawberry industry in the province of Huelva, around 2018–2019, some incidents of rape, forced prostitution of migrant workers and poor housing conditions and sanitation have been claimed.<ref>[https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2019/apr/14/rape-abuse-claims-spains-strawberry-industry Rape and abuse: the price of a job in Spain's strawberry industry?]</ref>

==Legal reform==
{{Unfocused|date=February 2020}}
In February 2014, a Spanish court ordered the arrest of China's former Party General Secretary [[Jiang Zemin]] and former Premier [[Li Peng]] for the alleged genocide and torture of the people of [[Tibet]].<ref name="The Diplomat">{{cite web|title=Spain Issues Arrest Order For Jiang Zemin, Li Peng|url=https://thediplomat.com/2014/02/spain-issues-arrest-order-for-jiang-zemin-li-peng/|website=Thediplomat.com|access-date=9 October 2014}}</ref> 
The Chinese government expressed anger at the actions of the Spanish court, with foreign ministry spokeswoman [[Hua Chunying]] stating "China is strongly dissatisfied and firmly opposed to the erroneous acts taken by the Spanish agencies in disregard of China's position."<ref name="ABC News">{{cite news|title=China angry over Spanish arrest warrant for former president Jiang Zemin|url=http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-02-12/an-china-angry-over-spanish-arrest-warrant-for-former-president/5253576|newspaper=ABC News|date=11 February 2014 |access-date=9 October 2014}}</ref>
In May 2014, in response to the diplomatic situation, the Spanish government repealed the [[universal jurisdiction]] law.<ref name="Christian Science Monitor">{{cite news|url=http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Europe/2014/0410/Spain-A-human-rights-avenger-no-longer|title=Spain: A human-rights avenger no longer?|date=10 April 2014|access-date=22 June 2018|newspaper=[[Christian Science Monitor]]}}</ref>

Former judge [[Baltasar Garzón]] has criticized the government's reform. Commenting on the judges ability to prosecute foreign crimes against humanity, genocides, and war crimes; he said, "The conditions that they're imposing are so exorbitant that it would be almost impossible to prosecute these crimes.<ref name="The Guardian">{{cite web|title=Spain regressing on human rights, says judge who pursued Pinochet|url=https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/feb/14/spain-human-rights-judge-baltasar-garzon|website=Theguardian.com|date=14 February 2014 }}</ref>

==See also==
* [[Francoist concentration camps]]
* [[Internet in Spain#Internet censorship in Spain|Internet censorship in Spain]]
* [[LGBT rights in Spain]]
* [[Environmental racism in Europe]]

==References==
{{Reflist}}

== External links ==
* [[Human Rights Watch]] on [http://hrw.org/doc/?t=europe&c=spain Spain]
* [[US Department of State]] [https://2001-2009.state.gov/g/drl/rls/hrrpt/2003/27865.htm Report on Human Rights] in [[Spain]], 2004 (Most text taken directly from this article)
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20060620065254/http://www.ifex.org/en/content/view/full/1084/ Censorship in Spain] - [[International Freedom of Expression Exchange|IFEX]]

{{Spain topics}}
{{Human rights in Europe}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Spain}}
[[Category:Human rights in Spain| ]]
[[Category:Environmental racism]]