Excavation work began yesterday morning on two sites roughly 9km outside Villanueva de la Vera (Cáceres) where it is believed that the bodies of five women executed by Franco's fascist forces on September 26th, 1936, will be found.

At the first site, relatives are hoping to find the bodies of Florentina Quintana Huertas, a 62-year-old widow with six children, and her daughters - Ángela Tornero Quintana (27) and Ana Tornero Quintana (25), whose husband, José María Naranjo, was executed and buried elsewhere, who was pregnant at the time of her execution, and who left behind a 15-month-old baby daughter.

Lucio García Tornero, who is one of Florentina's grandsons and who was present when work began yesterday, described the exercise as a "very necessary task."

In the second grave, which is only 200 metres from the first site, are the bodies of two women executed at the same time as the other three, but for reasons unknown, were buried separately. They are: Úrsula Sánchez Mate (58), whose husband, Tomás Salinero was buried elsewhere, and Bernarda García Hernández (26), who was unmarried.  

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