Spain pays last respects to Adolfo Suárez with three days of mourning

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/mar/24/spain-last-respects-adolfo-suarez

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King Juan Carlos joined politicians in parliament on Monday to pay their last respects to Adolfo Suárez, the country's first democratically elected prime minister following decades of right-wing rule under General Francisco Franco.

Prime minister Mariano Rajoy and other political leaders stood outside the parliament building as soldiers brought in Suárez's coffin to a slow and solemn drum beat. Flags flew at half-staff as Spain held three days of mourning for one of the key architects of Spain's transition from dictatorship to democracy in the 1970s. In his honour, the government announced that Madrid's Barajas airport would now be called Adolfo Suárez, Madrid-Barajas airport.

In the parliament, the king laid a Royal Order of Carlos III gold chain, Spain's highest civilian award, close to the coffin before expressing his condolences to Suárez's family.

Suárez's body lay in state on Monday before a burial on Tuesday in Avila, 60 miles north-west of the capital.

Suárez died on Sunday in a Madrid hospital aged 81. He had had Alzheimer's disease for a decade. In 1976, the king chose Suárez to guide the country towards a democratic parliamentary monarchy after Franco's death a year earlier. He was prime minister until 1981 and retired from politics in 1991.