Gibraltar Olive Press - Issue 121

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Vol. 5, Issue 121 www.theolivepress.es April 29th - May 12th, 2020

Taste of freedom IT was a taste of what is to come for parents and children in Spain at the weekend.

Mothers and sons, dads and daughters headed out to take the air, pick wild flowers and jump in puddles around Spain.

On bikes, scooters, skateboards, roller skates or just shanks pony, they

met and chatted with friends on street corners and in parks, without fear of arrest or a heavy fine.

Even better, from this weekend everyone will be allowed for exercise, as long as social distancing measures are kept. And, fingers crossed, the weather is meant to play ball! SEE REPORT ON PAGE 8

Picture by Mike Riely

This is not Armageddon!

Zeroing in!

Picture by Jon Clarke

Gibraltar’s tough approach on COVID-19 virus results in NO deaths and a very low caseload for health workers

By John Culatto

Mother of cancer victim Ashya King tells Olive Press why she has left the Jehovah’s Witnesses and wants to move back to Spain with her family

Tel: 952 147 834

See page 16

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c o n d i t i o n s .

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See a mother’s moving interview on pages 6-7

3 1 / 1 2 / 1 9 .

21/6/19 13:30

UK

WITH only around 10 active cases and over 130 people having recovered from COVID-19, Gibraltar is finally starting to lift its lockdown.

It has started with the elderly being given the right to exercise and will now continue by allowing non-essential businesses to start working again.

Numbers of active cases have dropped from the 60s to just four over the weekend, before increasing slightly on April 26.

The careful approach taken by the Gibraltar Government seems to have been rewarded with no deaths from the pandemic so far.

This has been achieved by careful planning and coord inat ion between every department, as well as the effort by citizens to stay at home.

Testing has BASED been very suc-

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APPLAUSE: Health workers take the plaudits at St Bernards

cessful, with nearly 1,000 swabs being carried out at the drive-thru testing centre at the Rooke site.

A random test of 400 people is now being followed by 200 tests of those working in frontline services.

These results, processed at Gibraltar laboratories, are helping medical experts work out what challenges lie ahead.

Looking forward, the authorities have asked to be included as part of the NHS for the first vaccines and medicine that are giv-

en the green light in the UK. The Gibraltar Health Authority will start to resume its basic medical clinics soon.

Plans are also in place for cancer screening and other important treatments to begin at St Bernard’s hospital.

“These low numbers of infections, and the absence of serious cases or deaths in Gibraltar is good news,” said Chief Minister Fabian Picardo.

“But it is ever-changing so we cannot get over confident in respect of a virus which is still very much in our community.

“COVID-19 is likely to remain a part of our world for many months or years to come.”

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NEWS IN BRIEF Speed freaks sought POLICE are looking for two drivers who broke the corona lockdown while speeding at 240 kph between Sevilla and Portugal.

The Guardia Civil have put a video of the pair online.

Neither is wearing masks or protective clothing, when they drove at 120 kph above the permitted limit on the A-49 highway in Huelva.

Jet set AT least 25 private jets have flown from Spain to the UK during the coronavirus lockdown.

Since March 23, another 27 private planes from France and 32 from Germany have also touched down in Britain, according to data from aviation consultancy WingX.

Dog walk row A DOG walker has been stabbed while walking his dog on the Costa del Sol. The 25-year-old Spanish man was hospitalised after the incident in Benalmadena on Saturday.

According to witnesses, the man was walking his pet when a Columbian neighbour tried to run over his dog. After a row the Columbian got out of his vehicle with a knife and an altercation ensued. The Columbian fled, but was traced, thanks to witness identification, to the rooftop of the apartment block where he lived and was quickly arrested.

Adams trio A TRIO from the same family have been arrested for robbing rural second homes in inland Malaga.

The thieves from Casarabonela took advantage of empty holiday properties not being taken care of during the coronavirus crisis.

Police however, caught the gang after a tip off and caught them red handed.

A range of valuables have now been returned to their owners.

NEWS

April 29th - May 12th 2020

Lockdown lust EXCLUSIVE

By Laurence Dollimore and Joshua Parfitt

SEX workers in Spain are still advertising for clients despite the ongoing coronavirus lockdown, the Olive Press can reveal.

They are breaking social distancing rules, while some are openly flaunting the Royal Decree with special ‘COVID-19’ discounts.

The adverts, printed in their dozens in various English newspapers, are ‘illegal’, particularly during the lockdown, Spain’s National Police confirmed this week.

One advert - offered by a

Sex workers are still meeting clients via British newspaper ads despite Spain’s strict coronavirus rules sex worker on the Costa del Sol - made reference to her location just metres from a Mercadona supermarket to give punters a cover story, if stopped by police.

While posing as a client, an Olive Press journalist was given a list of prices and services, answering to an advert, headed ‘Blonde - Offer COVID-19: €40,’.

When asked if she was still

Brothel of Europe Spain has been referred to as the ‘Brothel of Europe’ with a 2011 UN report ruling it was the third biggest prostitution Mecca in the world, behind only Thailand and Puerto Rico.

Since it was decriminalised in 1995, it has become a huge industry worth around €24.5 billion and with at least 300,000 workers.

However it has also led to a rise in human trafficking, with women shipped from around the world and forced to work at night.

One 2009 study by TAMPEP (European Network for HIV/STI Prevention and Health Promotion among Migrant Sex Workers), estimated 90% of sex workers in Spain are victims of human trafficking.

An illegal prostitution ring was busted in Andalucia this month, with 12 victims from South America, including a young girl, freed from flats in Jaen and Cordoba.

Prison for politician THE Spokesperson for Podemos Madrid, Isabel Serra Sanchez has been sentenced to 19 months in prison for her intervention in an eviction of a disabled person.

The 30-year-old (right) was found guilty of attacking police and causing minor injuries during the incident in Madrid in 2014.

She has been fined €2,000 and been banned from holding public office for a number of years, but was not found guilty of public disorder, which would have landed her a stiffer sentence.

She claimed it was a ‘dispro-

portionate and unfair sentence’ and added she would continue to fight to prevent evictions of families.

Another Podemos leader Pablo Echenique insisted the police had no evidence she was violent, during the eviction. He insisted she was ‘demonstrating peacefully’.

working despite the lockdown, she replied: “Sometimes and with a discreet person.”

Other adverts continue to offer ‘incalls’ and ‘outcalls’ in ‘private apartments’ despite the country being in its seventh week of lockdown.

The sex adverts in English are continuing to be printed across local English papers on the Costa Blanca, too, suggesting there is a nationwide breaking of the rules.

Spain has been on a national lockdown due to the coronavirus outbreak since March 14.

It has made all non-essential work effectively illegal and punishable under the law.

A spokesman for the Policia Nacional told the Olive Press that people should be aware that prostitution is illegal, whether the country is in lockdown or not.

“We want to clarify that prostitution is illegal in Spain,” he explained, “it does not matter if there is a lockdown or not.

“In Spain we are governed by the Organic Law 10/1995 of the penal code and its updates.”

People generally believe prostitution to be legal in Spain, but the reality is sex workers exist in a legal vacuum wherein the practice has been decriminalised since 1995 but no public laws have been written regarding their legal status.

But while the prostitutes may not be penalised, their clients can be. Although any sex worker caught meeting clients

Paedo breakthrough AUSTRALIAN police have helped link a child sex abuse video to a Spanish paedophile.

The suspect produced explicit videos of a young boy - aged four - to gain access to forums on the dark web.

International cooperation was key to cracking the case: with Europol supporting Spanish police by analysing information received from cops in Queensland.

Europol found that a 2015 video discovered in France may have been filmed in Spain.

Abuse

BREACH: Sex ads flouting COVID-19 rules

during the lockdown will also be punished.

One male escort was stopped and fined on his way to meet a client in Barcelona last month.

Another escort based on the Costa del Sol told the Olive Press he has been inundated with requests but has refused to meet with clients due to the coronavirus lockdown.

“I think a lot of sex workers are obeying the rules, but I guess some who have seen their incomes disappear are in desperate situations. It’s not an excuse though, just stay home,” he insisted.

The Olive Press has never published sex ads, while the Sur in English only stopped running them last year, after a new edict from the Junta de Andalucia.

Cops worked out that the suspect was also using a social media network where he was in touch with a woman who shared the same surname as the one in the title of the abuse video.

They eventually tracked him down to a home in Barcelona, where they seized a large amount of material which they believe could lead to further arrests in Spain.

Fernando Ruiz at Europol’s cybercrime unit insisted: “‘This type of international cooperation during the COVID-19 crisis shows how children are being protected as a priority.

“We encourage everyone to be aware of the dangers to children during this time.”

No minor incident

A DAD has been arrested after dumping his son on the side of a motorway to divert police and flee a roadblock.

The 36-year-old abandoned his child on the hard shoulder of the A-44 in Granada after nearly hitting a Guardia Civil officer.He has been charged with ‘crimes against road safety’ – dangerous driving and driving without a license. He also faces two other charges – the neglect of a child and disobeying a police officer. The bizarre stunt allowed the man to shake off the Guardia Civil officers, who were obliged by law to help the young child.

NEWS

www.theolivepress.es

Goodbye to the queen of the coast

April 29th - May 12th 2020

3

By Dilip Kuner

FOR 19 years she has been one of Spain’s most loved icons.

Hundreds of thousands of people have gazed at the awe-inspiring sight of the beauty and power of Asmara the Sumatran tigress as she padded round her enclosure at Fuengirola’s Biopark.

But children will no longer be able to press themselves against the glass screen that was all that separated them from the terrifying-yet-beautiful vision of the jungle queen.

At the age of 19 the oldest feline resident of the parc – and third oldest Sumatran Tiger in a world-wide breeding programme – has passed away.

It comes two years after her partner Rokan died and a postmortem has confirmed she did not die of Coronavirus.

She died of a tumour close to her heart, breaking the hearts of her keepers and other park workers.

“She was very impressive and curious and will be badly missed,” said Marta Perez, who works in marketing at Bioparc.

“She needed to be treated with respect and she could be fierce with people she did not know well.”

She herself had several cubs with Rokan, helping save this highly endangered species from extinction.

AN Andalucian photographer has scooped third prize at this year’s World Press Photo contest for his unbelievable shot of Iberian lynxes.

Antonio Pizarro, 47, who works at Diario de Sevilla, captured the moment a pair of the wild cats fled the sound of gunshot near Doñana National Park.

The veteran lensman’s snap, titled The King of Doñana, shows one lynx suspended in mid-air

Snap to it!

as it leaps for safety.

Since 2013 Sevilla-born Pizarro has gone to extraordinary lengths to snap the world’s most endangered feline species. He has even sometimes used a camouflaged semi-underwater bunker so he can remain undetected while being close to the action.

OAP - Old Age Pugilist Battling Ana del Valle - 106 years old - is the second oldest person to survive COVID globally

By Laurence Dollimore

SHE has survived two world wars and one civil war. Now an amazing centenarian, from Andalucia, has beaten the deadly coronavirus.

106-year-old Ana del Valle, from Ronda, has fought off

the illness to the cheers of her family and friends.

The pensioner, who has a good diet and walks daily, contracted the virus along with 60 other residents at her nursing home in Alcala del Valle.

While a few of them died, she was transferred to another home in La Linea, where she

POLLYWANNACOMEBACKA A PARROT that broke the Corona lockdown has been found safe and sound.

Jack, a Congo Grey parrot (left), escaped his cage, in Mijas, with owner Kara Caradas discovering he had chewed the wire in his indoor aviary in the garage and had vanished.

Caradas was exceptionally distraught that the much-loved family pet had disappeared and decided to offer a €500 reward for his return.

Once a post had been put out by a friend on social media, it got an amazing 150,000

hits and leading to Jack being spotted by a local homeowner on the roof of his house in La Cala hills.

The Spaniard immediately contacted Kara who went to pick him up to reunite him with his brother Wally.

Kara told the Olive Press: “I have never felt anguish like it. I could not eat or sleep. I was worrying he was calling me and I could not get to him.

“He is a huge part of the family and I am glad he managed to give everyone a happy story after all that”.

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learnt to read and write at the age of 80, and outlived her husband, who died 24 years ago.

Incredibly, it has emerged she also survived the dreaded Spanish flu at the age of seven.

Her family that counts four great-grandchilA COUPLE who had set sail from Spain to cross dren - revealed the Atlantic on a sailing boat did not know about that she had the lockdown measures until they reached land a been discovered month later. Italian, Elena Manighetti and Brit, ‘collapsed’ unRyan Osborne set off from Lanzarote on February der an oak tree, 28, when COVID-19 was still mainly contained while out fetchto China. They were stunned to find the world in ing milk. an ‘almost complete lockdown’ when they hit the “She was found Caribbean island of Bequia on March 25. “When many hours latRyan read out the news our jaws just dropped,” er by her mother Manighetti revealed. with a very high fever,” said her daughter in law Paqui Sanchez.

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NEWS

www.theolivepress.es

April 29th - May 12th 2020

‘Don’t forget the coriander, darling!’

By Charlie Smith

MIDDLE class British shoppers are helping keep Andalucian herb suppliers going through the critical coronavirus lockdown.

Millions of Home Counties home chefs have been dusting off their recipe books seeking out key ingredients such as fresh parsley and coriander.

“This has put a big demand on things,” said British food chief Peter Langdale, 65, the boss of Malaga agricultural firm Horto Palma SL, whose herbs end up in Waitrose and Tesco in the UK and Mercadona in

Bored Surrey housewives are driving demand for Spain’s fresh herbs, reveals one happy expat supplier Spain.

The expat of 34 years, originally from Scarborough, employs 150 people, with his firm exporting 99.9% of its produce, with the UK supermarkets its main market.

“We have actually been incredibly busy,” he told the Olive Press. “We have seen no real drop thanks to the foreign demand.

He added: “It’s thanks to the

middle class households stuck at home and fed up with what they’ve been cooking... so they get the recipe books out, which all want fresh herbs.”

And that is good news for the hundreds of busy suppliers working around the clock in southern Spain to provide the demand.

Tracking down the virus

GOVERNMENT plans for contact tracing to halt the spread of COVID-19 could face opposition over privacy concerns.

The method uses mobile phone data to track the movement of people who have the virus with those they come into contact with being given warnings of the possibility of infection.

However, one of the UK’s leading digital privacy groups, the Ada Lovelace Institute, said that using smartphones to control the pandemic could cause real problems.

Apart from the fact that many elderly people do not have smartphones, ‘contact tracing will be vulnerable to all forms of fraud and abuse’, said the watchdog.

In a separate study, a group of 300 technology experts recently urged countries to use Bluetooth instead of GPS. In response to Olive Press questions on April 28, Minister for Civil Contingencies Samantha Sacramento said she had looked into data protection law.

“We have taken legal advice on the matter

and it’s also been discussed at length with the Gibraltar Regulatory Authority,” said Sacramento.

“We are also very mindful of the fact that people who are over a certain age may not be that familiar with devices.

“We now have up to date and accurate telephone numbers and contact details for these individuals. Should we need to reach out to them and contact them in the absence of alternative sources such as an app, then we can easily do so.”

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Due to food production being an ‘essential service’ during the state of alarm, Langdale said his crops, including parsley, coriander and leeks, have largely been able to reach the UK as normal.

However, the company’s two garden centres in Malaga and Velez Malaga have been forced to close, with some staff put onto ERTE and others drafted into the food production side.

“When lockdown started there was some panic-buying and then a couple of weeks in there was a hiccup in retail sails, but now they’re back up,” Langdale added.

He added the Spanish farmers were doing a roaring trade, while less than normal was coming out of Italy and Portugal, much to do with the availability of labour.

While he said he considered himself privileged to be able to ‘keep going’, he said the crisis had been a ‘gamechanger for the global economy’.

He said: “Things will never be the same again and when added to Brexit and the rise of populism it’s certainly been tough.”

Avoid herd immunity HERD immunity is not the best way to tackle the COVID-19 pandemic, according to a World Health Organisation medical expert advising the government.

David Heymann told ministers they should focus on trying to stop as many people catching virus as possible.

Even though the lockdown is now being relaxed, social distancing is still seen as the best way to stop the virus spreading.

Heymann, a WHO infectious diseases expert based in London, said that there was not enough proof that having the virus and recovering guarantees immunity in the future.

“Professor Heymann confirmed that there are still many unanswered questions on community spread and immunity,” said Gibrlatar minister John Cortes.

“People with mild infections do not have much by way of detectable antibodies.”

Heymann pointed out that the masks are ‘recommended in enclosed spaces’ but that they don’t fully protect people from the disease.

However he conceded that the ‘wearing of masks stops the wearer from spreading the virus’ if they have contracted it and are showing no symptoms. Heymann highlighted the importance of a healthy lifestyle and the ‘successful strategy’ of Gibraltar, but also warned about ‘complacency’.

NEWS

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Fined and furious

GIBRALTAR-registered cars are being impounded in Spain as part of strict

COVID-19 measures, it has emerged.

The Spanish authorities

have seized nearly 30 Gibraltar vehicles and are not releasing them until they

800 covidiots fined for going out illegally NEARLY 800 people have been reported for leaving home without any valid reason during the Gibraltar lockdown.

The RGP, GDP and Customs have recorded a total of 799 breaches of COVID-19 regulations set to keep the public safe.

This information was recently made public by RGP Commissioner Ian McGrail.

Of these 799, 30 arrests have been carried out, eight of which are only due to COVID breaches

and 22 of which were accompanied with other offences.

Nearly 200 of the breaches were from people over the age of 70, and 68 people were forced to be taken home by officers.

The large majority, 699 people, were asked or warned to go home as opposed to being arrested or fined. Multiple offenders have since been arrested after not complying with law enforcement officers, many of which have been juveniles.

The wheels of industry must start turning – goodbye China!

A

ND so it was that the Covid 19 pandemic exposed the catastrophic de-industrialisation of the West.

A combination of greed, neglect, complacency and laziness allowed this to happen.

So while we boasted of our wealth, the industrial base was degraded so badly that it could not produce simple textiles to make face masks and medical gowns or even high technology equipment such as respirators.

At this time the West should feel not only fear (which we are invited by our governments to feel) but also a deep sense of shame that we exported all our knowhow to the Far East, settled into lives of complacency and left ourselves and the new generations vulnerable.

The day of reckoning will come soon but business is business and it is as plain that the days of importing massive quantities of products from the Far East are finished.

Two countries already lead the way. Germany which jealously protected the industrial base which it rebuilt from the maelstrom of the Second World War and Japan which is already recalling all its production bases from China.

The logic could not be sim-

By Charles Gomez

pler; if we are going to suffer the biggest decline in living standards since the Middle Ages, who is going to be mad enough to order goods from the sweatshops of the Far East?

Make no mistake! Industry is coming home to Europe and other Western countries. Our own peoples will not accept the indignities of unemployment and poverty.

It may be true that segments of our populations have lost the work ethic but a generation of factory closures and their substitution with a virtual economy based on “invisibles” must be redressed..

Prosperity can no longer be achieved by computer algorithms but only by real assets and production. The “invisibles” have turned out to be like the fine material from which the Emperor’s new clothes were made in the famous children’s fairy tale.

It is now an urgent requirement that as much production as possible be sourced from within.

Ironically this new arrangement will mean that we not just say goodbye not just to reliance on China but possibly hello to a new European common market. From now

on production must be local and of the very best quality.

Collaboration between European countries, it will have to be based on flexibility.

If the battle cry from the World Health Organisation was “test, test, test”, the survival of Western economies will require us to “train, train and retrain” for the new economy.

These are testing times but it is wrong to say they are ‘unprecedented’. There is a relatively recent precedent in the ‘Spanish flu’ pandemic of 1919 which caused such destruction. Yet by the early 1920’s the western economies were not just up and running again, they were booming. The decade came to be known “the Roaring 20’s” to denote the explosion of wealth, innovation and production that followed. By all means let us abide by the sometimes contradictory advice of the health experts but when it comes to the economy and the survival of our civilisation, do not listen to the defeatists. This is a call to action.

Charles Gomez is a Gibraltarian barrister and an associate professor of international law of the University of Cadiz. This first appeared in Reachextra.

April 29th - May 12th 2020

5

Spain ramps up crackdown on Gib-plated cars during lockdown

are re-registered with Spanish license plates.

In order to import them, owners must pay import duty and administration costs.

The law in both Gibraltar and Spain states that residents must register vehicles in their country of residence.

However there has, for a long time, been a grey area for Gibraltarians with residency on both sides of the frontier.

Police in Spain are understood to have started requesting evidence of Spanish residency.

They are then enforcing the re-registering of plates for those with residency in Spain, who drive a Gibraltar-registered vehicle.

These importation fines range from €42 to as much as €17,800 and could not come at a worse time for cash-strapped workers.

Chief Minister Fabian Picardo said: “If you are a resident of Spain, then you cannot be in possession of a vehicle which is not registered as Spanish.

“I’m hugely sympathetic if somebody has been caught out inadvertently in that respect.”

Delayed justice A 23-YEAR-OLD male has been identified as the culprit of a burglary which took place back in February.

The gig was up when Nabil Medhurst could not give RGP officers a good reason for why he was out and about during Gibraltar’s general COVID-19 lockdown.

Officers then identified Medhurst as the person who burgled a restaurant in Ocean Village back on February 23.

The burglary saw money and other belongings stolen and Medhurst was charged with Burglary and Leaving a place of residence without a valid reason to do so.

Deaths remembered A SIMPLE memorial ceremony has been held to commemorate Workers Memorial Day in the Lobby of Parliament.

The Chief Minister Fabian Picardo, Minister for Employment Gilbert Licudi and Unite the Union heads laid wreaths to salute all who had died in the pandemic so far.

“This year in particular we think of health workers around the world who have lost their lives at work treating those with COVID 19,” said Picardo.

“As the grandson of a man who died at work, I remember the grandfather I never knew and my pride in having introduced the observance of this day in Gibraltar.

None have died at work in Gibraltar since I became Chief Minister, despite a huge increase in construction, and I hope none ever will again.”

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www.theolivepress.es Voted top expat paper in Spain

A campaigning, community newspaper, the Olive Press represents the huge expatriate community in Spain with an estimated readership, including the websites, of more than two million people a month.

OPINION Tough love

THE Spanish government must feel stuck between a rock and a hard place as it attempts to take its country out of the coronavirus lockdown.

Its people are growing weary of being confined to their homes and want to have more freedoms returned, but letting things return to normal too quickly could result in a second and deadlier wave of COVID-19.

Either way, it’s hard for leaders to navigate deescalation plans while maintaining popularity. Luckily, Pedro Sanchez’s government seems to have the health and wellbeing of the Spanish people as its top priority.

Its four phase plan seems initially fair - if a bit short on detail - and is clearly designed by common sense.

The decision to let provinces which have been less impacted by the virus lift restrictions sooner stops unnecessary roadblocks to economic recovery.

Clearly businesses are going to be hurt, with capacity limits set at 30 to 50% until mid-June, but it’s what must be done, initially at least, to prevent a second wave of a disease which has killed nearly 25,000 Spaniards. Let’s hope businesses are supported both during AND after this whole crisis ends.

Sex sells IT is morally reprehensible at best: Pages of sex adverts advertising every kink and quirk under the sun.

But whether prostitution is legal or not and sex workers should be allowed to solicit or not, is irrelevent in the heart of the COVID-19 crisis.

For the current Royal Decrees make it implicitly clear who CAN and who CANNOT work.

And there are very good reasons behind that, however frustrating and painful it is for many workers, particularly self employed autonomos, who are really struggling in this crisis. It is called social distancing - preventing the spread of the disease - which can hardly be possible in the case of a prostitute. So when you find so-called ‘community newspapers’ openly encouraging ‘COVID-19 specials’ from sex workers on their pages, they can hardly be called responsible. They are cashing in on a mucky trade that sails mostly below the margins, particularly right now.

It is time to call out these hypocrites for what they are.

Publisher / Editor

Jon Clarke, jon@theolivepress.es Charlie Smith charlie@theolivepress.es

Joshua Parfitt joshua@theolivepress.es

Laurence Dollimore laurence@theolivepress.es

John Culatto johnc@theolivepress.es

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FEATURE

‘THEY are holed up at home and terrified this is Armageddon,” says Naghmeh King, her distress unalleviated by the sunshine pouring into her apartment with its idyllic views along the Costa del Sol coastline.

“They think coronavirus is the great plague God prophesied and they will only be saved if their belief in Jehovah is strong enough” adds the 50-year-old mother of Ashya King.

The family made global headlines in 2014 when she and her husband fled Britain for Spain seeking ground-breaking cancer treatment for their youngest son, now 10, sparking an international manhunt leading to their arrest and imprisonment in Madrid.

Six years after that heart-rending saga, Naghmeh is in flight from a new terror: brainwashing.

“They are scared, so scared, and their father is being so strict,” she reveals. “Do this, do that, making them say their prayers before every meal and repeat them after him every night.”

Naghmeh is talking about husband Brett, 56, and their seven children, locked down in the family home in Milton Keynes, that she managed to escape just before the travel ban was enforced.

“I couldn’t deal with it and came at the beginning of March,” she tells the Olive Press at the modest three bedroom apartment in Casares, near Estepona, where she has pinned up photos of her children on the wall and various dictionaries and bibles are strewn on the coffee table.

“I told them I would come and self isolate here, where I will be safe. Brett said he didn’t want me to leave the house, he does not have enough faith that God will protect him. He thinks he will die from the coronavirus. I simply couldn’t take it anymore.”

It is a cautionary tale and moving proof that extreme religion can sometimes break up families.

Talking to the paper to express her ‘disgust’ at the religion she has been trying to leave for years, she claims her husband has been ‘brainwashed’ by the Jehovah’s Witnesses who ‘owe’ her a five-figure sum of money. More of which later.

Hers is a story that was thrust into the global spotlight when she and husband Brett, from Portsmouth, decided that the cancer treatment their then-five-year-

EXCLUSIVE

By Jon Clarke

I’VE BRO FREE!

old son Ashya was receiving in Southampton was a danger to his life.

Believing he needed the much more benign Proton Beam Therapy (PBT) - which at €70,000 the NHS trust would not fund - they smuggled him out of the hospital and drove straight onto a ferry from Portsmouth to Europe to prevent him becoming a ward of court.

They planned to make for their holiday home in Malaga where four of their children were born and where they hoped the gentler Mediterranean climate would allow Ashya to recuperate while they sought PBT elsewhere.

But their departure led to a global outcry with Interpol quickly called in to locate them.

While they attempted to lay low in a hotel in neighbouring Axarquia they were not hard to locate, being nine in number counting the other children, Danny, now 29, Naveed, 26, Sirus, 20, Yusha, 14, Matty, 13, and This is NOT Armageddon, insists Sion, 8.

“Basically, the receptionist mother of cancer victim Ashya King found out who we were and as she seeks sanctuary in Spain once called the police,” recalls Naghmeh today. “Ashya was more - this time from the clutches of taken to hospital in Malaga and we were taken to jail.

Jehovah’s Witnesses We were kept for three days in a police cell in Malaga, then prison in Madrid. proving from the trauma It is clear she means it and “It was really, really bad, I of brain surgery to remove - having known her for six never knew how the author- a tumour, he still has pro- years and spoken to her on ities worked, they took over found disabilities, she re- various occasions - she and our life. We were charged veals (see side bar).

I both know it will be a batwith child cruelty and I Now Naghmeh is going tle as tough as the one she feared losing Ashya for through another major up- went through with Ashya. good. I was so scared.” heaval in her life, having Naghmeh’s story began Thanks to a decided to when her Iranian family massive releave the sent her to do her A-levels sponse by the church she in England at the age of 16.

UK media - and Making them say became in- Packing her off from Tehran the Olive Press, prayers before volved in at to Blackburn, where she which worked age of had an uncle, they hoped every meal and the closely with 20, some she might end up at Camthem, aiding repeat them after three de- bridge with a career in artheir appeal cades ago. or medicine. him every night Insisting it is chitecture a petition was “But things all changed raised asking d e f i n i t i ve l y when I met Brett, who was for their rethe time to a bank manager, in Camlease, allowing them to be move on, she is making an bridge, with a second job reunited with Ashya. urgent, heart-felt appeal to running a guesthouse busi“An amazing 250,000 peo- her husband to leave the ness,” she explains, with a ple demanded that Ashya religion too and join her in glint in her eye. “He was 24 should be given back to us,” Spain with their family, at and we quickly fell in love continues Naghmeh, recall- least the youngest four. and got married a year lating the emergency court hearing in Madrid, linked up to the High Court in London, where it was agreed they should be allowed to take their son for emergency PBT treatment in Prague.

“Our lawyer Juan Isidro, from Sevilla, was excellent and reaaly helped get us out,” she insists. “Soon Ashya was getting treatment in Prague.”

While her son is slowly im-

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STRONG: Naghmeh King has fought tooth and nail for her kids

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April 29th - May 12th 2020

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DREAM TEAM

BIG FAMILY: Naghmeh King and her seven children

finally got sucked in and mas, Halloween or Easter, while she disliked the end- and they kept telling us less meetings and the way that in the next few years the ‘elders’ sometimes Armageddon would happen treated her children, she and everyone would die,” started to believe that she says Naghmeh. could save people’s lives “They want you to believe and immersed herself in that the world is a terrible the religion. place. It was a joyless reThe indoctrination contin- ligion and it is no surprise ued as the couple launched that tens of thousands are their own successful prop- leaving it every year,” she erty business renovating adds with a shudder. and selling homes in Mil- After the drama with Ashya ton Keynes, and starting a they returned to the UK, family. but life back there made They ended up buying a Naghmeh think long and trio of homes on the Costa hard about the religion and del Sol from the proceeds her role in it. and finally moved to Spain “I have now completely er.” that he started to say the ‘to learn Spanish and lead come out and three years While her parents were Lord’s Prayer before meals a simpler, holier life’, in ago I told Brett I wanted 1999. to leave. I wrote a letter to not happy with her deci- and before going to bed.” sion, wanting her to come So when a few months after They arrived, via Honduras, the church and told Brett home to Iran, the pair led getting out they received with three children in tow, to deliver it. But he said he a charmed life, with the the proverbial knock on the with Brett firstly working as wouldn’t give them the bad income Brett was making door from a pair of local a gardener before landing news. from his two jobs.

Jehovah’s Witnesses, Brett a cushy job as an estate “I just feel so angry that agent with we have paid them so They bought a leafy home i m m e d i a t e l y Kristina Sze- much money. I worked out in Milton Keynes, but their took an interkely and later it is £42,000 and I want it happiness was short lived est.

Prison would Interealty. back. They give you books when Brett was jailed for “His name Over the next and say they need money have a longfalsifying mortgage forms (a was Michael decade they for electricity and to adver‘white collar crime’, Nagh- Michaels, a meh insists) which ended Greek guy, lasting effect on had four more tise, advertise, advertise. up getting him sacked from and he gave his life and their kids - all born I’m writing to them to get it in Marbella’s back.” his bank job. him a few relationship Costa del Sol She continues: “I’m defiHis term was only a year m a g a z i n e s hospital - and nitely happier now I’ve in the low security Bedford which Brett ended up left, I feel free and have prison, but it would have a found intermeeting a large group of got more time to think and long-lasting effect on his esting,” recalls Naghmeh. life and their relationship, Three weeks later Michaels like-minded families via the study. Now I just want my she insists today. returned to persuade Brett various Jehovah’s groups children back. I want them to come over and live with “It was horrible for him and to go to the local Kingdom on the coast.

“I sort of put up with it and me here in Spain and I he came out all skinny,” Hall for a meeting. she remembers. “But while “I refused to go, I was not we had to go to church two have been looking at bigger there he took a close inter- interested and kept throw- or three times a week, we homes to rent.

“Brett and I have est in religion…particularly ing the magazines out. I c o u l d n ’ t the not really disfrom a cell mate who taught told him they were simply c e l e b r a t e ess pr ve oli bir thdays, cussed it, but I him about Noah’s ark and brainwashing him.”

SOS Migrantdon’t want to go the floods. And it was then But almost inevitably, she or Christ- Ebola outbreak fear home.

“Brett is fairly brainwashed by it, Save right now for sure.

Our Ashya King was declared cancer free two were opening and shutting, he “I keep telling n So years ago. But the courageous youngster is was moving. We felt he needhim we should sit still profoundly disabled and may never fully ed a chance to recuperate. down and discuss Malaga recover from the trauma of his ordeal, as his We couldn’t risk him losing it, not allow other mother Naghmeh tells the Olive Press in her his sight or hearing. It was an men in a church own heartfelt words. intense pressurised time trav- SPLASH: Front page in 2014 tell us what to do.

“He is OK, he can go up the stairs by himself elling with him in the car.

“Brett’s been tellbut he has to sit down to come down the I had to feed him through his nostrils, ing me about divorce, he stairs. He can walk a few steps, but often he could not eat or swallow anything, he said if I’m not part of the falls. He is still paralysed and has a crossed couldn’t even drink water, he was totally parreligion he won’t allow the eye as well. alysed. children to talk to me. It’s “They took a big part of his brain, during He can’t write properly yet, his hand shakes, illegal. It is more serious. the eight hour operation but chemothera- but he is starting to read and do sums. He “It hasn’t got to the stage py would have killed him. We were told he has one to one in the class, he needs someof a lawyer, but I am being would not have sight or hearing after it. His one to hold his hand at school, but he can’t really firm with him when ears would dry out, his eyes would dry out. do secondary school and he cannot stay at speaking on the phone.

But they said Proton Beam Therapy would the school he is at now. In Spain he can. If he “I’ve told him I don’t want not work on his cancer, and would not fund it. came here they would take his shunt out (a We realised we had to leave, get away from valve and tube which takes brain fluid into them to have to pray in the England … the state would have taken him the stomach and the spine) and he could then house any more. We can away so we didn’t say anything. go to school here in Spain as a normal child. read the bible ourselves “We knew he was making progress, his eyes That’s what I’m hoping for.” and discuss it, of course, but no more brainwashing.”

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on the border of the A GIANT stand-off ensued this weekend with hundreds of miSpanish enclave of Melilla with Morocco, grants storming the border. a Tangier to Tarifa ferry was In another attempt to enter Europe, three migrants hid themafter held up for two hours on Sunday, from the deck of the selves in the motor. Passengers watched were hauled from their Intershipping ferry, as the Moroccans estimated that 1,800 people hiding place near the blades. It is this year.

Mediterranean the cross have already died trying to

ASHYA: On the mend, six years on

See our feature on drug- and people-trafficking

MALAGA is facing a potential Ebola outbreak after a Nigerian man, 40, displayed symptoms of the deadly virus.

The Carlos Haya hospital (above) launched emergency protocols on Sunday, while hospital sources admitted they were ‘completely unprepared’ for an outbreak.

The man is being kept in protective isolation until results are received. It is feared he contracted the disease on a trip home to Nigeria.

"If it turns out that he has got Ebola, then we will all get it," a hospital worker said, adding that the hospital is unable to deal with such serious cases.

The man - who lives in Antequera - arrived with a high fever, and was immediately put into isolation.

Aside from the fever, he did not show any other recognisable symptoms such as nausea, vomiting and bleeding.

At least two other suspected victims in Spain have turned out to be false alarms over the last fortnight.

See page 20

on Page 6

By Tom Powell and Rob Horgan in Casares and Joe Chivers in the Axarquia

EXCLUSIVE: Costa friends reveal Ashya King was diagnosed in Spain, where his family had previously lived for many years

REUNITED: Ashya King and family (right)

TERMINALLY ill Ashya King was diagnosed with a brain tumour in Spain before being rushed back to England for emergency treatment, the Olive Press can reveal.

The seriously-ill British child - whose parents Brett and Naghmeh fled England last week sparking an international manhunt - had been taken to a local clinic after suffering headaches.

“He had been having headaches back in the UK as well so they took him to a doctor who referred him to hospital for a scan, which was when they found out he had just months to live,” said family friend Joseph Lathey, 20, who knows the Kings from Jehovah’s Witness meetings.

The family-of-nine had only just returned to the home they have owned in Casares for the last decade, looking forward to a long summer holiday.

The Olive Press can reveal they have been living on/ off in Spain since buying the beachside apartment 10 Turn to page 4

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Based around the country, their remit is to find original and interesting stories, as well as get behind the headlines and investigate the crime and corruption that has often given Spain a bad name.

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Spain’s tourism industry unlikely to fully reopen until 1-lockdown the end of the year as initial plans to lift coronavirus restrictions revealed (114,024 visitors) in his 90s in Spain argues he should be allowed 2-toMan break lockdown rules as he’s the only inhabitant in left in his hamlet (36,868) COVID-19: Spain’s Andalucia plans to open shops 3- from May 11 and bars and restaurants from May 25 (30,727) in Spain are impounding Gibraltar-registered 4- Police cars, with some drivers invoiced up to €17,000 in COVID-19 clampdown (28,973) BREAKING: Spain set to allow individual outdoor 5- exercise and walks from May 2 in more loosening of coronavirus restrictions (27,976)

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NEWS

April 29th - May 12th 2020

Expat businesses in Spain welcome four-step plan to recovery, but fear huge losses despite being able to open again in May EXCLUSIVE

By Laurence Dollimore and Jon Clarke

Taste of freedom

400 people outdoors and 50 indoors.

By early June, it is envisaged that more restrictions will be lifted, although restaurants could still be limited to a capacity of just 50% with ‘strict separation’ between customers.

“I’m cautiously optimistic,” said British hotel and restaurant owner James Stuart, of the Califa group, in Vejer.

“Restaurants with a good reputation and clientele will do all right, particularly if they have decent sized outdoor terraces.”

He added that bookings for his 10 businesses were ‘pretty strong’ for July and August mostly from Spanish clients - but that June would ‘most likely be a washout’.

“While I welcome the news and we will be opening a few

restaurants and hotels as soon as we are allowed in May, we are worried about our larger ones.

“It is vital that town halls allow restaurants to have much more space for tables and that we are able to operate with smaller numbers of staff.

“In particular the government needs to let us know about the ERTE employment measures and give us more specifics about what are the barriers and spaces needed between tables,” he added.

Another long term hotel owner in Ronda, Andy Chapell, of Molino del Santo, said: “While I welcome the news and we will be delighted to reopen, I am very cautious until flights are restored to near-normal levels.

“Until then we will not be able to generate sufficient business

to cover our costs.”

Meanwhile, the boss of Marbella’s landmark La Sala Group, was also cautiously optimistic, while admitting that his company would likely lose ‘over €6 million’ this year.

“While it is great news to hear that people can start to get back to their normal lives, and start the recovery of what was taken away from them, it’s not necessarily great news for businesses working mainly in the tourist market,” said Chairman Ian Radford.

“With our core market being mainly UK and Scandinavian, and the fact borders will not be open probably until July or beyond, being open will only increase our losses to date this year.

“We have lost over 12,000 reservations booked over the last 12 months and we have

reduced our sales forecast by over €6 million for 2020.”

However, he continued that they had ‘bigger challenges’, such as trying to protect their 200-plus staff and families in the long term.

“We are working on finding a business model that protects our staff, but also provides our loyal customers with what they want.

Perspective

“It will be a tricky balance to find, but we will find it. We have to!”

And he added: “Let’s put things into perspective there are so many people in much worse situations and we can only hope that something good for the world comes out of the misery.”

The plan laid out by Sanchez

OP QUICK Crossword

states that the country will come out of lockdown in four phases (0 to 3) over a two month period (see panel).

It follows an announcement on Monday that cafes, bars and restaurants will be allowed to open in Andalucia on May 25.

The rules will only allow punters to spend up to 30 minutes having breakfast and 90 minutes having lunch and supper to allow other clients to use the establishments.

There will be a reservation limit of four and people will be banned from sharing dishes while establishments must have air conditioning filters installed and strict disinfecting rotas.

Opinion Page 6

Across 1 Roomy (8) 5 Image of a deity (4) 9 Borders (5) 10 Cushion for kneeling (7) 11 Dog of mixed breed (7) 13 Shouts (5) 14 17th letter of the Greek alphabet (3) 16 Overzealous (5) 18 Little drink (3) 20 Science of logic, quantity, shape and arrangement (Abbr.) (5) 22 Loss of memory (7) 24 Makes journeys (7) 26 Young hooter (5) 27 A great deal (4) 28 Frenzied rush (8) Down 1 Cooking vessel (7) 2 Inert elemental gas (5) 3 Underwriter (7) 4 Exclamation of disgust (3) 6 Draws aimlessly (7) 7 Finds pleasing (5) 8 Wan (4) 12 North African oil state (5) 15 Survive (7) 17 “Raiders of the Lost Ark” actor

OP Sudoku

EXPAT businesses across Andalucia have welcomed the news they could reopen in May following seven weeks of stasis.

However, they remain extremely cautious about making plans until the international tourist market returns.

It comes after Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez revealed his four-step ‘de-escalation’ plan last night after a week of positive COVID-19 data.

The plan vows that life will return to a ‘new normal’ by June, with restaurants, hotels and businesses allowed to gradually open throughout May - albeit at heavily reduced capacities.

As long as the numbers of infections continue to drop, restaurant terraces will be allowed to open, as well as hotels and other tourist accommodation, on May 11.

Some two weeks later, restaurant dining rooms can open for business, while cinemas, theatres and museums will also be allowed to take in clients.

Cultural events such as weddings will be able to take place with a capacity of up to

--- Elliott (7) 19 Chatter (7) 20 Broken rock for road repairs (5) 21 Killed (4) 23 Find the answer (5) 25 Posed (3)

All solutions are on page 14

Net gains NETFLIX has added 16 million new users during the coronavirus crisis.

The streaming platform had its biggest three month gain in its 13-year history, with shares also soaring by a staggering 31%.

The profits recorded during this period are €653 million, more than double that in the same period last year.

It is thought to be the media company least impacted by COVID-19, with the business model perfectly set for a population made suddenly housebound.

LA CULTURA

9

April 29th - May 12th 2020

Glory for Gamel

Full works of expat poet Gamel Woolsey set to be released

By Charlie Smith

SHE is one of Spain’s most distinguished expats.

Buried in Malaga’s celebrated English Cemetery, she wrote widely about the country and was known around the world.

Now, the first complete works of her poetry are set to be released.

In perfect timing for the end of the lockdown the Complete Poetic Work of Gamel Woolsey will showcase the many poems she wrote about Andalucia,

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One day Juliette alights the metro a few stops early and discovers an unusual book shop with an even more unusual owner, Soliman.

Soliman believes that people need to be paired with the correct books: books that will help or satisfy them in some way and tasks Juliette with finding the perfect home for a stack of books.

Filled with literary references and a genuine love of books, this short novel really captures the imagination and leaves you with a warm, content feeling at the end.

The Bookshop San Pedro, www.thebookshop.es

where she lived for many years.

American Woolsey, from South Carolina, lived with and married fellow expat Gerald Brenan, who is credited with writing some of the key 20th century books on Spain.

She and the Englishman lived in Churriana, near Malaga, in a home that is now a museum to Brenan’s life and works.

The news was announced on World Book Day by the Renaissance publishing house that is based out of the Gerald Brenan House.

The collection of the writer’s poems have been translated by long-time expat Carlos Pranger, who is related to Brenan.

Woolsey also penned several acclaimed books, including Death’s Other Kingdom, which was reissued as Malaga Burning, and One Way of Love, which was initially rejected for being ‘too explicit’.

She lived in Andalucia on and

off for decades, before dying from cancer in 1968 in the home La Reina de los Ángeles, which was falling into dereliction before the Olive Press launched a campaign to save it in 2007.

In 2014 it finally reopened as a museum and has since hosted hundreds of conferences, gigs, film screenings and book clubs.

The couple had first moved in in 1934 two years before the Spanish Civil War. They were forced to leave the country for over a decade to

return in 1953 against a backdrop of Francoism and great poverty and strife.

Over the years it became a cultural mecca for writers including Ernest Hemingway, Paul Bowles and Bertrand Russell.

Brenan spent most of his life in Spain after first renting a house in the tiny village of Yegen in the Alpujarras region of Granada.

His critically acclaimed account of the Civil War was published in the seminal book, The Spanish Labyrinth.

Woody from the trees!

HE is one of the world’s most prolific - and controversial - directors.

Now Woody Allen’s latest movie about Spain is to get an Autumn release.

Set in the Basque region, Rifkin’s Festival centres on a husband and wife’s individual love affairs at the San Sebastian Film Festival.

The movie, starring Elena Anaya, Louis Garrel and Gina Gershon, was made last year.

It comes as Allen recently denied again that he had molested his daughter Dylan Farrow, 34.

He wrote about it in his autobiography Apropos of Nothing, published in March.

IT was set to be one of the most exciting tours of Spain this year.

But now a mini tour of the country and nearby Portugal by Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds has been rescheduled for the same time next year.

The Australian/British legends - famous for the theme tune to smash UK drama Peaky Blinders - will be performing in Madrid and Barcelona in May 2021.

All original tickets will remain valid, with additional tickets also on sale.

“When we finally do the shows they will be f***ing mind-blowing,” Cave promised.

10

April 29th - May 12th 2020

LA CULTURA

SPECIAL DISPATCH: A secret Nazi U-boat base, macabre facilities for facial reconstruction surgery, bank transactions traced to the highest echelons of the Third Reich. Conor McGlone (right) asks how Fuerteventura’s mysterious past sheds light on Spain’s troubled history

ISOLATED: Windswept Jandia peninsula where Villa Winter allegedly hid fleeing Nazis

The shadow of fascism

S

cores of roosting doves erupted from the decrepit courtyard as we entered. I'm not easily spooked but something in the air felt very wrong. A punch bag and gloves hung in one corner, a couple of chained-up rottweilers were in the opposite. Budgies languished in a birdcage, next to an inscription that read: "History is the cage that imprisons us."

There was an unnatural stillness to the air and a strong scent of sedentary humanity but there was no turning back now - it had been no small feat getting here.

While the Canary Islands bring to mind neatly packaged cheap winter sunshine, there is much more to Fuerteventura than sunburn and cervezas. This you will know if like us you have risked the 40-minute hair-raising offroad drive on Fuerteventura's rugged southern tip, the Jandía peninsula, to be rewarded with epic views of a ridge of volcanic mountains trailing like a giant's stepping stones to the sea.

At the foot of the mountains lie miles of windswept beaches, with perfect white sand and barely a speck of civilization in sight, a tapestry of cloud, light and blue, changing quickly in the

blustery weather. exterior, gulls wheel and cry piteThere is one conspicuous ex- ously. A rooster calls. ception. Few visitors make it A gruff, stocky man barred our up a second dusty track, to Vil- way, demanding a 'donation' as la Winter, a grandiose turreted he gestured at a lopsided piece building, nestled impossibly at of wood with 'museo' scrawled the base of the mountains. In on it. This man, I later discovthe 1930s, when the building ered, was Pedro Fumero. was constructed, the setting Fumero's grandfather had would have been even more re- helped to build Villa Winter and mote, accessible only by donkey his four uncles were hired by or camel.

Winter's family as guards of the Disturbing rumours had brought house at the end of the 70s. us here. Legend In the 90s the has it that the Winter's sold the base was conhouse to a large High-ranking structed by the hotel and conSS officers German engineer struction compaGustav Winter, ny and his relafinanced by the underwent facial tives - unaware of Nazi regime. surgery to alter the sale - ceased During the Secto receive the ond World War, it their appearance small salary they is said, the base had formerly reacted as a secret ceived to look aflaunchpad for U-boats, utilizing ter the house. a subterranean network of vol- Returning from Tenerife in 2012 canic caves. After the war, it be- and finding the place in a state came one of the last refuges of of utter disrepair, with his relthe Third Reich, where high-rank- atives barely surviving in the ing SS officers fled to undergo fa- squalid conditions, a heart-brocial surgery to alter their appear- ken Fumero decided to stay to ance, on the way to new lives in look after them. Remembering South America. the stories his grandfather had Now, wandering goats and don- told him about the "upside-down keys roam about the ramshackle ships" (as he called the subma-

rines), Fumero vowed to uncover the truth.

Gustav Winter's own life is shrouded in mystery. We know that in 1928 he built the power plant CICER on neighbouring island Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, which has been described as "a masterpiece of German engineering". During his time working on Gran Canaria, Winter (pictured top right) became fascinated by the Jandía peninsula.

Legend has it that In 1939, Winter arrived on Fuerteventura with a suitcase filled with cash on a special mission to purchase the strategic peninsula for the Nazis.

While Winter denied this until his death in 1971, historians agree that there were German submarines in the Canaries archipelago during the war. This is despite Franco declaring Spain to be neutral at the outbreak of the Second World War. He was, after all, heavily indebted to Hitler for helping him brutally win the Spanish civil war.

During the Second World War, the Jandía peninsula was blocked off from the rest of the island. The local inhabitants were only allowed back in the 1950s, when the Franco regime finally removed a fence which

crossed the peninsula from coast to coast.

As we nosed about the small museum located in a stifling back room, I was struck by the uncomfortable thought that the exhibits, laid out without any explanation or context, could be treated as pure memorabilia, a Neo-nazi shrine (see below).

There were old Nazi uniforms and news clippings, huge wartime radio sets and photographs of dead soldiers. There were test tubes and nasty looking syringes as well as serious-looking batteries, alleged by Fumero to have powered submarines.

Darwin Vidal, a German engineer who has been working with Fumero for the last four years to investigate the rumours, told me ‘everything indicates’ that the Winter house was used as a na-

val base. Local documents date the house as being built in 1946, but Vidal claims the "bunker" or base of the building was built before the war.

According to Vidal, the 1.4-metre-thick reinforced concrete walls, the vaulted ceiling, and imposing tower - that looks suspiciously like a lighthouse - are all clues that the villa was used to provision German U-boats.

The rest of the house was built after the war, in Vidal's opinion as "an ideal place to hide and escape allied arrests". The presence of several windowless rooms, for example, could have been used to conceal people.

Vidal, who has been tirelessly combing the national archives in Germany, said there is ample evidence that Winter collaborated with the Nazi regime, bringing

MYSTERIOUS: Villa Winter and its cornocopia of Nazi memorabilia while (top) museum boss Fumero

LA CULTURA HOARD: Of Nazi U-boat batteries and tech, while (right) Gustav Winter him ‘a great fortune’. purchase of Jandía state that the faVidal claims he has the paper trail that cilities should "be compatible with shows Winter received 2,000,000 Rethe needs of the German navy". Vidal ichsmark in 1939 - equivalent today to also said he had proof that German €123 million - from Hitler's right-hand specialists in military construction had man and father of the Gestapo, Herbeen sent to Fuerteventura around man Göring. this time.

He said documents supporting the This suspicious activity did not go un-

noticed. After the war, according to Vidal, Winter appeared on a list drawn up by the allied forces of 104 wanted German agents in Spain. Like other Germans on the list, Winter was not handed over by the Spanish authorities and died a free man in Gran Canaria.

Top secret: What FBI documents tell us about island’s Nazi secret In 1973 an FBI informer reported that “a number of former Nazis live on the Island of Fuerteventura”. That is, according to a declassified FBI report from 1973.

Released by the CIA in 2001, the documents propose a theory that top-ranking Nazi official Martin Bormann (left), had not actually died in 1945 but was alive and living in Zurich.

Bormann is thought to have been instrumental in the Nazi’s flight capital programme, which saw millions of dollars of blood money and gold smuggled out of Germany via Spain before the allied victory.

In 2009 the Olive Press investigated a mid-1940s ‘Nazi gold train’, which allegedly came to Gibraltar via Spain (see website).

The same informer also reported: “Large land holdings in the Jandia section of the island are either owned by ex-Nazis who receive the income from them, or are sites of their residences. A man named Winter reportedly acts on behalf of the Nazis in their real estate dealings”.

11

April 29th - May 12th 2020

ter turned into a historic tourist attraction, directed his venom towards the government, which he says is ashamed of the island's dark past.

Fumero said the government could compel Lopesan to maintain the building "as is done in cases of historic buildings or they could directly negotiate to acquire it...but the government does not take action, and Lopesan prefers to wait for it to fall before recognizing the rights of my family and reaching an agreement."

"They all have responsibility for it. The Winter family sold the house to Lopesan with my uncles inside, as if they were mere furniture," he said bitterly.

Lopesan did not return my calls and neither did the local government, the Cabildo.

But it seems Villa Winter is not something the government wishes to publicise. It Fumero told me life was hard for the lois certainly not in any glossy tourist brocals in Jandía under fascist rule. "Many chures. This might seem odd on an island people worked as medianeros [shareso heavily dependent on the tourist Euro croppers], cultivating and caring for but perhaps not; the presence of such livestock, but half of the benefits went a place suggests state to the owners of the complicity in some very unland". Fumero alleges conscionable practices. In Winter made use of this The loss of mainstream Spanish polipunishing system. tics, we have seen recent autonomy, "As always happens, gains by the far-right and it some [locals] benefited, has taken almost 50 years surveillance especially those who since Franco's death for his collaborated with him or and many body to be exhumed from worked as 'watchmen'... the Valle de los Caídos, the beatings but for the majority, it shrine he built as a triummeant the loss of auphant homage to fascism tonomy, surveillance and a sneer at democracy. and many beatings," he said.

In the absence of any true reconciliation, Fumero described the concentration many Spaniards still do not know where camp in Fuerteventura in Tefia, which their grandparents, murdered by Franco's survived until 1966, as "another dark forces, are buried. It was not without a cerchapter of the island". He says Winter tain sense of relief that I buckled up for the used the inmates as slaves to build spectacular drive back to civilisation. But it the path that led from the centre of the was no longer the evil spectres of the notisland to the villa, the so-called camino so-distant past looming among the crumde los presos or 'inmates' path'. bling turrets that sent shivers up my spine, Vidal says it is probable Villa Winter itit was the sense I had of how in Spain the self was built with slave labour. present is so mercilessly chained to its Later, Fumerom, who wants Villa Wintroubled history.

FOOD,DRINK & TRAVEL

12

April 29 - May 11 2020

Recently arrived culinary expats give us their latest installment in their castaway cooking collection

Put some bang in your banger

F

OR the last few weeks they have been holed up in Granada following a coronavirus travel nightmare (Into the frying pan, Issue 340, March 16). But now British couple Yianni Papoutsis, 44 and Sophie O’Hara, 26, have turned lockdown into a culi-

nary showdown.

To continue their new series of quarantine recipes for the Olive Press, the pair explore the curious Spanish origins of Jambalaya. Stay tuned for more and check out their blog @nice. olation on Instagram.

Sausage Jambalaya Having arrived in Spain with nothing but hand luggage five days before the State of Alarm, we moved into our house exactly 12 hours before the lockdown was imposed. This left us with one very brief shopping trip to a Chinese bazaar to purchase everything we needed from pots and pans to bath towels and bedsheets. Hence we have very little in the way of kitchen utensils so have a new

found appreciation for one pot wonders such as this simple Jambalaya.

Originated in the French quarter of New Orleans by Spanish sailors wanting to recreate paella; without access to saffron they used tomatoes supplied by the Italian community. This however is a Cajun Jambalaya hailing from the swamplands of Louisiana and as such it leaves out the tomatoes which

appear in the Creole versions from New Orleans. Please feel free to add some if you’re in a tomatoey mood.

Rice, (ideally long grain), is rice simmered in stock with a few simple spices, a variety of meats and vegetables. It almost always uses some kind of smoked sausage and the backbone of the flavour comes from the ‘holy trinity’ of Cajan cooking: onions, celery and green peppers. You can serve it dry like a paella or add more liquid to make it a soupy stew.

History, adventure and romance.

That’s just the setting.

Castaway cooking

Serves 2-3

By Yianni and Sophie

Ingredients: ●● 2 tbsp olive oil ●● 3 garlic cloves, whole with skins on ●● 5 large bay leaves ●● 1/2 tsp freshly ground black pepper ●● 120g longaniza or other smokey sausage, sliced ●● 1 stick of celery, diced ●● 1 onion, diced ●● 2 long thin green peppers, one roughly chopped, one diced ●● 225g long grain rice ●● 750ml chicken stock ●● 1 dash of chilli sauce (optional) ●● Salt and black pepper to taste ●● 50g frozen peas

Method: Step 1 Rinse the rice in cold water until the water runs clear then leave to soak in fresh water for at least twenty minutes, up to four hours.

Step 2 Fry the garlic cloves, bay leaves, black pepper and sausage in the oil in a wide frying pan over a medium heat. Brown the sausages remove and set aside.

Step 3 Fry the the peppers, onions and celery until they are a deep golden brown.

Step 4 Drain the rice and add to the pan. Stir until it is all coated in the oil (about one minute).

Step 5 Add the stock together with the chilli sauce (if using) and cooked sausage.

The liquid should just cover everything in the pan, if it doesn’t top it up with more stock, water (or chopped tomatoes for a Creole style Jambalaya). Stir to combine, add salt and pepper to taste, bring to a boil then turn the heat down low and simmer uncovered for fifteen minutes until almost all of the liquid has disappeared.

Step 6 Sprinkle the peas over the top, straight from the freezer, do not stir it. Cover with a tight fitting lid and leave off the heat for ten to twenty minutes to allow the rice to fluff up. Serve with cold beer, crusty bread and whilst singing ‘Jambalaya’ to the tune Bamboléo by the Gypsy Kings.

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FOOD,DRINK & TRAVEL Spice up your life These essential seasonings will quash your hunger for your favourite British condiments during lockdown

April 29 - May 11 2020

13

(Paprika) it might not be worth it’s weight in gold, but is a rockstar found in Spanish food all the same. It’s what makes chorizo red and what gives the famed Galician octopus dish its characteristic smokey tinge.

Report by

Cristina Hodgson Azafrán

(Saffron) is the world’s most expensive spice and one of the most characteristic in the Spanish cuisine. Nicknamed ‘oro rojo,’ red gold. Cultivating saffron is an extremely labour-intensive crop.

The weight of the spice is worth more than gold. Think of that next time you eat a paella and I can guarantee you will not want to put any Worcester Sauce near it.

M

ISSING your English Mustard, Branston Pickle and a dollop of HP Sauce on your

Pepper and Garlic to name but a few.

By using the freshest possible produce, fish, meats and cheeses, plate? basic ingredients are Personally, I love a bit of left to shine in Spanish brown sauce (even though I’m cuisine, needing only a a vegetarian). But be warned, pinch of salt or just one you will not find this much or two spices for searenowned British condiment soning.

Making the English anywhere in inland Spain.

Don’t even ask for it, no one Mustard sometimes rewill know what on earth you’re ferred to as ‘the most patriotic of all British talking about.

But the local shopkeepers, in sauces’ seem insigniftheir willingness to help, will icant and insepid in go through all the items in the comparison. shop to see if they do indeed The simplest of comstock this magical condiment, pounds, salt, is however the most and you will paramount NOT be able to Spanish to leave until Spain has cuisine. they’ve fin206 Michelin ished.

Where would On the coast, Spain’s gastronorestaurants, my and tapas be some superincluding 11 markets stock without their hugely popuHP Sauce, but three-stars lar cured at exorbitant meats, prices. such as You’ve come to a foreign country, why on Jamon? earth stick to fish and chips, A Spanish chef would mash and green peas – or the rather have his or her child nicknamed stuff you put on them?

The Spanish cuisine is incred- ‘feo’ than hear the ibly diverse. word ‘sosa’ meaning With countless peculiarities in bland, regarding his the Spanish menu, surprise culinary arts. yourself by finding your new And you would be favourite sauce or realise that, hard-pressed to find in fact, you have no need for a Spanish recipe that ghastly– or fancy, depending does not have salt in it, but on your the level of amor pa- mixed with other natural ingredients such as vegetables, triae– sauces.

Condiments in any cuisine whole grains, olive oil, nuts, gives a unique personality to fish, eggs, poultry, pulses and meat, the nosh will always be each dish.

In Mediterranean terrain it healthy. couldn’t be any other way: But the true joy comes to Saffron, Paprika, Cayenne those hard-core garlic fans,

you will find garlic in every other dish prepared in Spain.

Why bother with horseradish sauce, when you can have a totally natural flavouring which brings out the flavour with a bang to the blandest of foods.

Garlic in Spain is enjoyed in many forms: fried and crunchy with oil, lemon and salt as a salad dressing; spread on bread with some olive oil and is an essential ingredient in many cold summer soups like gazpacho, salamorejo, ajoblanco or alioli.

Not that the latter is a soup, rather a thick garlic sauce. Best NOT to slurp it up, especially if you’re out on the pull.

For those exceptionally brave, or with a fixation on vampires, there is also raw, pickled or smoked garlic.

Spices aside, I best warn of a peculiar beverage that might throw an unsuspecting tourist and even now after over a decade of living in Spain I’m not sure if I like it or not.

Chufa horchata, a plant milk beverage, originating as far back as the 13th-century Valencia, made with soaked, ground, and sweetened tiger nuts usually served with ice.

If rice pudding does it for you, be ready to be seduced by this milk beverage that is sweet and creamy, with a smooth texture.

Thankfully Churros make up for the oddity of the foremost ‘desert.’ and you don’t even need to feel bad about consuming so many calories at one go. As they say, ‘A churro is only a breadstick that dared to dream...’

However Spanish chefs must be doing something right, Spain has 206 Michelin restaurants, including 11 three-star restaurants.

There is a Michelin restaurant in nearly every region and major city of Spain.

Pimienta de Cayena (Cayenne Pepper), the smaller the spicier, these sun-dried peppers are incorporated in many local dishes, including the popular ‘pil-pil prawns’ served in a mouthwatering oil, garlic and cayenne pepper sauce. Some die-hard fans of cayenne pepper refer to it as not only a condiment, but a ‘philosophy of life.’

14

April 29 - May 12 2020

Med for your head

SPAIN’S Mediterranen diet can help keep your brain in gear, as well as your waistline in the clear, scientists have found.

Frequently lauded by health gurus for its mixture of seafood, vegetables, nuts and olive oil, the Med way of eating can help fight dementia.

A study in the Alzheimer’s and Dementia journal found that people who eat more fish have slower rates of decline in their cognitive functions.

Those with a higher genetic risk of Alzheimer’s, who are carriers of the APOE gene, were found to benefit from this diet, researchers found.

The study, authored by Dr Emily Chew from the National Eye Institute in Maryland, US, comprised two trials of almost 8,000 elderly volunteers.

Participants were sufferers of AMD, an ‘age-related eye condition’, and were tested for their consumption of grains, fish, olive oil and fruit and veg.

HEALTH Death sentence Spain’s high coronavirus death toll owes to its huge obesity problem, warns doctor A SPANISH scientist has warned that obesity could be behind Spain and Italy’s

high coronavirus mortality rates.

Francisco Tinahones, pres-

ident of the Spanish Society for the Study of Obesity (SEEDO), said this could be

The race is on

THE Oxford Vaccine Group has started human trials on its coronavirus vaccine, but Europe is still lagging behind overall.

The main research areas are the US (46% of ongoing projects), Asia (38%), while Australia and Europe are each conducting 18% of current studies.

In terms of cash flow, 72% of vaccine efforts are privately funded, while universities are bankrolling 28% of studies.

Oxford’s ongoing trials for its hAdOx1 nCoV-19 coronavirus vaccine are not set to finish until September.

It is being produced by the Serum Institute of India, the world’s largest vaccine producer, which produces 1.5 billion doses for various diseases every year.

Around 1,100 people are set to take part in this trial, which is partly funded by the British Government.

why some Meditteranean nations have fared worse than China or South Korea.

He said there was ‘some evidence’ to support this explanation of why COVID-19 claimed the lives of 23,521 in Spain yet less than 5,000 in the two Asian countries put together.

“There are several articles that already clearly show that subjects with obesity are more at risk of dying and needing intensive care, even more so in those who are morbidly obese” he said.

Morbidly obese coronavirus patients – those with a BMI of over 40 – are twice as likely to experience complications and be put on a ventilator as

Never give in!

D

AY 50 of cancer lockdown with my French partner and chef, Joffrey Charles, and the good news is I am not starving.

My oncology appointments have been postponed twice at Costa Del Sol Hospital, Marbella - last November due to radiotherapy burns and again on April 15th, a casualty of the lockdown. But there is happiness to be found in small things. There was an extensive search recently for Joffrey’s electric shaver and much joy when he found it lollygagging in the back of a cupboard. He left it lying precariously on top of

those who are are a ‘healthy weight’ – those whose BMI is between 19-25.

The risk of morbidly obese patients needing artificial assitance breathing is 86%, while it is 60% for obese people (those with a BMI of 30 or more) and 47% for people who are a ‘healthy weight’.

Tianhones stressed that obese people are likely to experience increased inflamation and have a ‘decreased lung capacity’, which make them more susceptible to COVID-19.

Around 25% of the Spanish population is overweight or obese, with 131,000 deaths attributed to the diseases every year.

Lisa Burgess

COVID-19 lockdown has denied Lisa Burgess vital oncology appointments but her chef partner’s kitchen skills have at least put a smile on her face a cotton bud container and my elbow sent it flying to the floor in pieces. I have learned a lot about my partner under lockdown and one of them is that his hair grows much faster than mine. I am just grateful to have any.

We have remote control wars in our household, I am a news junkie, he loves action movies, comedies and cookery shows. We have managed to compromise but, mon Dieu, after a two-hour ses-

sion with CNN, I discovered he is an ardent capitalist and I am a passionate centrist. Debates rage heatedly at Casa de Joffrey y Lisa.

Talking about passion, I am keeping busy writing my semi-autobiographical novel, Dirty Burgess.

It’s my Irish nickname in reference to a much-loved Irish movie, The Snapper. I recently sent off the first three chapters, edited 25 times since January. It’s racy but not 50 Shades of Lisa - more Bridget Jones meets Samantha Jones with a touch of Love Story.

Hollywood hasn’t been on speed dial yet but I may be calling my friend and former work colleague there, Bobby Farrelly, who made Dumb & Dumber.

Inspired

Joffrey offered to help feed frontline workers in Mijas but due to my deficient bone marrow and weak immune system, he is not permitted. We shut down our catering and food delivery business in Mijas quickly due to coronavirus. So now he is offering to help cancer charities using his bi-lingual skills to comfort the French community. More Sky News and Spanish Congress for me, less Trainwreck and Rambo for him.

On the food and cleaning front, things are going swimmingly. I am not allowed in the kitchen or on the deep cleaning. Monsieur is the aficionado of both - no prob-

OP Puzzle solutions

Across: 7 Spacious, 5 Idol, 9 Edges, 10 Hassock, 11 Mongrel, 13 Yells, 14 Rho, 16 Rabid, 18 Sip, 20 Maths, 22 Amnesia, 24 Travels, 26 Owlet, 27 Lots, 28 Stampede.

Down: 1 Steamer, 2 Argon, 3 Insurer, 4 Ugh, 6 Doodles, 7 Likes, 8 Ashy, 12 Libya, 15 Outlast, 17 Denholm, 19 Prattle, 20 Metal, 21 Slew, 23 Solve, 25 Sat.

SUDOKU

Quick Crossword

4 9 1 5 7 3 6 2 8

2 7 3 4 6 8 5 9 1

5 6 8 9 2 1 3 7 4

3 4 7 8 5 9 1 6 2

1 5 9 6 4 2 8 3 7

6 8 2 3 1 7 9 4 5

7 3 5 1 9 4 2 8 6

8 2 6 7 3 5 4 1 9

9 1 4 2 8 6 7 5 3

Puzzle by websudoku.com

lemo Joffers. His budget cooking under lockdown has been a marvel. One night he rustled up stuffed pork steak with glazed carrots and made-from-scratch onion gravy. The remainder of the pork in the fridge was used the following night for a stir fry pork with noodles and vegetables.

Tonight is spaghetti Napolitano my favorite - with lashings of grated cheese. I could easily eat that three nights in a row. I learned much during my 8-month long chemotherapy last year about foods that boost your immune system so I incorporate 5 vegetables, nuts, or fruits into my diet every day. Joffrey has had to swap his Twix bar for mandarins, Coca-cola for fruit smoothies, crisps for pistachio nuts and strawberries for M&M’s. He is allowed his donuts to maintain the entente cordiale.

While Joffrey is watching France’s Top Professional Chef, I post a daily tribute to a person or couple I know on my Facebook page and end the night with an inspirational quote, just in case there is someone up at 4 am feeling desperate. I have been there. In a world where you can be anything, be kind. I repeat this nightly to myself while gazing longingly at a portrait of my darling departed Irish mother, Ann Burgess.

My biggest challenge this week has been a call to arms from a TV production company in the UK. They are working on a proj-

TEAM: Joffrey and Lisa

ect about Andalucia before lockdown. The aim, when it airs to millions in the UK and Europe, is to attract national and international tourism to our region when the borders reopen. I am assisting for free in finding archive video footage of Andalucia so I have had the enormous task of finding drone pilots, bodegas, travel companies, tourist boards, and more. I have been hung up on a few times but it just made me persist more.

I celebrated with a fruity cava after receiving beautiful archive footage and joined my first, virgin Zoom party in Dulwich, London with my English friends. It was hilarious as we kept talking over each other. Two glasses in, I had to be put on mute quickly - much like the Zoom UK cabinet! I am planning a Zoom pub quiz for this weekend. I am nominated as the first Magnus Magnusson about the USA so Joffrey beware!

We are also laying the foundations for another Joffrey’s restaurant on the Costa, someday over the rainbow.

I know I have at least five operations ahead and I still don’t know if those cancer node buggers have got the better of me. I am aiming to rise like the Phoenix from the golden ashes with a 20-year-old body, a 52-year-old mind, and a handsome 30-yearold affluent chef on my arm but patience is necessary.

Joffrey and I are avidly watching the various projects globally in the race for a vaccine. You can guess France is his pick, mine is the UK’s Oxford University.

France’s Charles De Gaulle once said, ‘Faced with a crisis, the man of character falls back upon himself’ but I am more inspired by Winston Churchill’s rallying call during World War II: ‘Never give up, never give in’. We certainly will not, Sir!

THE Bank of Spain has estimated that the economy will shrink by up to 14% this year.

The bank claims the economy has shrunk by 4.7% already up to the end of March.

The best case scenario would be a drop of 6.6%, while the worst case scenario could see figures as high as 14%.

That means that there won’t be the perfect rebound –

BUSINESS

No rebound Economy set to shrink by up to 14% this year as unemployment set to rise by 20% called ‘recovery’ in a V shape – as many pundits had predicted.

Despite initial predictions the economy would recover to the state it was before the pan-

Gem of an idea IT is as heart-warming as it is clever.

Jewellery firm TOUS is giving all women who have given birth during the COVID crisis a free gift.

The Spanish firm has come up with a special line of gifts which it will hand out to all mums, who have recently given birth.

In honour of Mother’s Day, on May 3, the firm made a video starring real women who have given birth in recent weeks.

This year marks 100 years since TOUS was founded.

demic, it is now thought that the crisis will leave considerable debt and unemployment levels will soar.

It is believed that unemployment levels will rise between 18% and 22%, without including the workers that have been put on ERTE schemes.

The bank led by Governor Pablo Hernandez de Cos, recognises that there is great uncertainty and admits that circumstances may cause the numbers to change.

Some 80% of companies around Spain have seen a reduction in business, while only 10% have seen an increase.

Liberty Seguros supports the NGO Doctors Without Borders in their work against COVID-19 in Europe, especially in support of the elderly, migrants and homeless people The company has made a donation to Doctors Without Borders to support its professionals who are responding in Europe to the medical needs generated by the pandemic and its consequences. ► Doctors Without Borders provides pandemic management solutions in different crisis committees, such as designing external hospitalisation units to help reduce the hospitals’ congestions. ► Doctors Without Borders has focused its efforts on those places where the epidemic is hitting harder and on the most vulnerable social groups: elderly, homeless, and immigrants.

Liberty is a company that is committed to society and aware of the importance of the support from private companies to the organisations that are leading the management of the COVID-19 health emergency and its consequences. For that reason, the insurer has made various donations to entities operating in Spain, Portugal, Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland, where it carries out its business operations in Europe.

Thus, it has donated 250,000 euros to the NGO Doctors Without Borders, with the aim of supporting professionals who are responding in Europe to medical needs. generated by this pandemic, which has mainly hit Italy and Spain and affected 100 other countries throughout the world.

“At Liberty, we want people feel safe.

Therefore, as a socially responsible company, we believe that it is our obligation to make an effort to support the professionals who are working day by day to protect people and helping to stop this crisis. We also want to thank them for everything they are doing for our employees, clients, mediators and partners, for our families and for our society at large”, explains Tom McIlduff, CEO of Liberty in Europe.

In other European countries, Doctors

Without Borders has focused its efforts on those places where the epidemic is hitting hard, with the most virulence, and among the most vulnerable social groups: the elderly, homeless and immigrants. In this way, its work strategy includes three areas: technical and strategic support and advice to hospitals and health centres; advisory work, training and support in nursing homes and support for vulnerable groups such as the homeless and migrants.

In Spain, their response has focused on advice and support when preparing intervention and decongestion plans of health care structures, thanks to a highly experienced group of professionals.

To this day, Doctors Without Borders in Spain has participated in the evaluation of the response in around 12 hospitals, collaborated in the creation of 22 hospital extensions, which are allowing to decongest emergencies and intensive care rooms, and also facilitating the delivery of medical materials and logistical resources.

In addition, with the aim of maximizing their response capacity and reaching the maximum number of health professionals, socio-health workers, cleaning personnel, structure managers and other professionals, Doctors Without Borders in Spain has developed some tools such as guides, protocols and audiovisual content, which are accessible on a specific website for professionals.

This disease seriously affects the elderly.

Thus, a large part of the efforts of Doctors Without Borders have focused on this vulnerable group and on supporting nursing homes. So far, more than 100 nursing homes in Spain have already been advised, and they continue to work to reach many more. In Portugal, Doctor Without Borders teams have started to visit nursing homes and supporting authorities and management teams to train staff and establish basic hygiene and prevention of transmission measures. In Italy, they support a network of nursing homes in various cities, to prevent the spread of affected cases.

In France and Belgium, Doctors Without Borders is focused on helping migrants and homeless people. Thus, its teams have been pulled out in some of the emergency shelters established to accommodate people living on the streets during the confinement and in other collective accommodation facilities, providing medical support, assessing health status and identify possible COVID 19 cases. They also attend general enquiries close to food distribution points, five days a week.

Other Liberty initiatives to support entities that protect people from COVID 19 in Europe In Spain, Liberty has made a donation of 50,000 euros to the Red Cross to help with sending medical supplies to medical professionals and hospital centres in the most affected regions, as well as delivering food and other basic necessities to those in need. It has also contributed by making a donation to the NGO Messengers of Peace, to help with the distribution of food to soup kitchens for the elderly, and to the Foundation for the Promotion of Development and Integration (FDI). This aid will go towards carrying out psychomotricity courses to help young people with disabilities – a group that is particularly vulnerable at this moment in time.

In Ireland, donations have also been made to Pieta House and Alone. These charities reach protected characteristic groups that are at specific risk of social exclusion, such as the elderly and people with mental health disorders.

Liberty Seguros has also ensured its help has reached Portugal with a donation to CASA (Centro de Apoio aos Sem Abrigo).

CASA is delivering food to people in need in quarantined areas. Also, in our neighbouring country and thanks to another donation made by the insurance company to APAMETAL, 500 protection masks have been produced and delivered to health personnel at the Sao José Hospital in Lisbon.

To find the location of your nearest broker/agent, please visit www. libertyexpatriates.es. or simply call 91 342 25 49

15

April 29th - May 12th 2020

Take them back SPAIN’S High Court has ordered Ryanair to reinstate 224 members of staff it sacked across Spain.

Judges said the Dublin-based company’s reason for the redundancies – that it was closing four bases – was ‘not good enough’.

Michael O’Leary’s budget airline has been told it needs to reinstate workers ‘in the same working conditions’ with ‘immediate payment of wages not received.’

The travel giant has told its lawyers to launch an appeal.

It comes after the low-cost operator axed its bases at Tenerife, Lanzarote, Gran Canaria and Girona on January 8 this year.

Ryanair fired workers at these regional sites, although it U-turned in Girona and was accused of ‘pressuring’ employees there to accept pay cuts of up to 25% on new contracts.

The layoffs were in response to the grounding of Boeing 737 MAX planes in the wake of an Ethiopian plane crash, which claimed the lives of 157 people.

In court Ryanair lawyers failed to convince judges that a combination of the Boeing situation and Brexit was enough to get rid of staff.

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RECLUSIVE mountain goats have been photographed roaming empty streets and scaling

Toeing the party fine

Family, neighbours and Olive Press on hand to surprise British expat on key birthday

CORONAVIRUS may have stopped Peggy Bloomfield from celebrating her 100th birthday in style.

But it didn’t stop neighbours, friends and the local authorities from surprising her with a ‘Feliz Cumpleaños’ sung from a distance of

Last dance

A MAN is under investigation for a serious disobedience after he was filmed dancing ‘Sevillanas’ dressed as a woman in sunglasses in Alicante.

He faces a fine of up to €30,000 for wearing a ‘wig’, a ‘mask’ and ‘women’s clothes’ in an attempt to hide his identity on a Santa Pola street.

But it took agents until just the next day to find out his real identity and charge him.

two metres outside her Spanish villa.

The planned day of merriment, booked for a beachfront restaurant, in Moraira, on the Costa Blanca was sorely missed.

Children and grandchildren from the UK could only wish her well via Zoom and WhatsApp, while on site at the Pinar de l’Advocat urbanisation, hugs were offered and then withdrawn, banked for an unknown date in our uncertain future.

But still, a bottle of champagne – served by local PP leader Raul Llobell – flowed in glasses, handed out with the utmost precaution.

Meanwhile, a series of helium balloons were provided by her favourite local community paper, the Olive Press.

houses in one inland Sevilla town.

The Iberian Ibex were seen on the roof of this house in Moron de la Frontera.

While not an endangered species, the creatures are quite rare and become more active during spring as plants and food return to the mountainsides.

EXCLUSIVE

By Joshua Parfitt

Shouts of ‘See you down the pub later!’ were met with a sparkle of laughter on Peggy’s big day.

“It’s so very nice of you all, thank you, I really appreciate it. I really do,” Peggy announced. The idea was the brainchild of longtime friend Shirley Young, who organised the stunt with local PP member Sarah Richardson.

“I love Peggy so much,” Shirley told the Olive Press, on the verge of tears.

She met Peggy 14 years ago, when she

had just arrived from Cambridge.

“She’s like a mother to me,” adding Peggy was notorious for normally staying out later than partygoers half her age.

Sarah Richardson added: “Civil Protection have been taking bookings in the crisis for children celebrating birthdays – so I thought, why not celebrate a 100th?”

Peggy’s daughter, Val applied for a letter from the Queen, predictably not arriving in time for the big day.

“It is due to arrive shortly,” she said hopefully.

THE Mayor of Vilafranca de Bonany in Mallorca has been fined €3,000 after attending a boozy party during the nationwide lockdown.

Montserrat Rossello was found hiding out in a backroom when the Guardia Civil stormed a property on the outskirts of the village.

Police had been tipped off by several residents in the area who believed that their neighbour was holding a social gathering in their house.

When responding officers entered inside, they found numerous bottles of alcohol as well as three ‘intoxicated’ individuals.