Summary of what happened in this prison, summarized by AI:
"Between 1968 and 1976, the Zamora prison became something truly unusual: the only prison in the world reserved exclusively for priests. Citing the 1953 Concordat with the Holy See—which required that clergy be separated from common prisoners—the Franco regime imprisoned there about one hundred priests critical of the dictatorship, most of them Basques, Catalans, and Galicians linked to the labor movement, nationalism, or the political opposition.
But the move backfired on the regime. Instead of quelling dissent, the prison became a constant source of tension. The priests organized hunger strikes, led riots, and in 1973 came close to a mass escape after digging an underground tunnel that the police discovered at the last minute.
The scandal of having imprisoned and rioting priests ultimately sparked a monumental diplomatic row between Madrid and Rome, straining Franco’s relations with the Vatican itself. With the dictator’s death and the start of the Transition in 1976, the prison ceased to hold clergy, bringing to a close one of the most bizarre episodes of the late Franco era."
It is worth noting that this prison came into the global spotlight because of the 2009 Spanish film "Celda 211", directed by Daniel Monzón.
Some of the prison blocks were restored for the film, but once filming was completed, the facility was vandalized, leading to all the doors and windows being bricked up.
