The University of Valencia has introduced the University Chair of studies about terrorism and its victim’s rights, fuelled by the Department of Justice, Interior and Public Administration in an act where we could find the rector of the University of Valencia, M. Vicenta Mestre; the councillor of Justice, Interior and Public Administration, Gabriela Bravo; the general director of Democratic Renovations and Access to Justice, José García Añón; the dean of the Faculty of Law, Francisco Javier Palao; and the director of the chair and professor of Criminal Law of the UV, José L. González Cussac; and which had assisting representatives of associations of terrorism victims, of the security bodies and forces of the State and university professors.

This chair is the first in Spain specialized on political violence and rights of the victims that it causes and, furthermore, its research activity will organize courses and seminars to preserve the memory of the victims.

According to the councillor, “this chair will look beyond the books and essays because it will look through the eyes of the victims, since their testimony is the best way for the student body to assimilate the values of cohabitation and respect”.

On his behalf, Cussac defended the idea that “killing a man is never defending an idea, it’s only and always killing a man” and expressed the complete rejection of the chair to any kind of violence or intimidation with the intention of subverting the institutional order.

The dean has reported that the figure of the victims in the education curriculums has always been relieved to a residual space. This way, he indicates that “we always talk about the criminals, but never about the victims”.

The rector, on her behalf highlighted that this new chair is one more sample of the existent complicity between the department and the University, a collaboration from which the student body and society in general will benefit.