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Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez Thursday called on Spaniards to defend the "miracle" of their democracy as the divided country marked the 50th anniversary of ex-dictator Francisco Franco's death. The general's demise on November 20, 1975 ended 36 years of authoritarian right-wing rule that followed a devastating 1936-1939 civil war which brought him to power.Spain then embarked on a transition to democracy that has seen it become a stable EU and Nato member and one of the world's wealthiest countries. "That November 20 did not only mark the end of Western Europe's last dictatorship, but also the beginning of a journey that would lead us to regain freedom and prosperity and to win back lost democracy," Sanchez wrote on news website elDiario.es. "Let us remember that we live in a unique country, that we live in a present that represented a tiny possibility 50 years ago," added Sanchez in the article published late on Wednesday. "Spain, Spaniards, both men and women, will never let that miracle disappear." "Democracy is our power. Let's defend it," the Socialist leader added in an X post Thursday.Franco's legacy continues to split society, with experts warning that inaccurate social media content has spurred a positive opinion among young people with scant knowledge of the period. According to a poll published Thursday by *El Pais daily, almost one-quarter of Spaniards aged 18 to 28 believed an authoritarian regime may "sometimes" be preferable to a democracy. Around 40% of respondents had a "very good", "good" or neutral opinion of the regime, while 55% viewed it as "bad" or "very bad". "It is precisely now, when some idealise authoritarian regimes and cling to nostalgia for a past that never was, when we must step forward in defence of a freedom that was snatched from us for so many years," Sanchez wrote in elDiario.es. No official commemorative events were planned Thursday under the "50 years of Spain at Liberty" programme, with the government saying it aimed to celebrate the recovery of democracy throughout the year.The conservative opposition says Sanchez plays "the Franco card" to distract attention from a series of corruption investigations that threaten to topple his minority leftist coalition. It has accused the government of reopening the wounds of the past with legislation that aims to pay tribute to the memory of Franco's victims, vowing to repeal the laws if it returns to power.A mass in honour of Franco was held Thursday at a memorial site outside Madrid formerly called the Valley of the Fallen, seen as a triumphalist monument to the general's side in the civil war. The government exhumed Franco's remains from the renamed Valley of Cuelgamuros in 2019 to stop it becoming a shrine for far-right sympathisers.Around 25 people gathered at his current resting place in a cemetery in Madrid's northern outskirts, some bringing flowers and making fascist salutes. Luis Lopez, a 48-year-old driver who arrived carrying a Franco-era Spanish flag, told AFP the dictator "did a lot for the country and his true worth is not recognised". The Francisco Franco Foundation, which the government is seeking to dissolve, and his family have organised commemorative masses across Spain.

Chileans are voting in a presidential election Sunday that's pitting the governing leftist coalition against an array of right-wing candidates and will also redefine the country's legislature. There are eight candidates in the race and none are expected to get the 50% plus one vote needed to win the election outright, likely triggering a run-off between the top two candidates on December 14.Chilean law bans opinion polls 15 days before elections but the last numbers showed Jeannette Jara, the governing coalition candidate from the Communist Party, in the lead, with far-right Jose Antonio Kast, from the Republican Party, in second.Experienced moderate-right politician Evelyn Matthei, a former mayor and senator, led early polls but dipped in recent months and has been trading third place with libertarian firebrand Johannes Kaiser from the National Libertarian Party.Polling stations around Santiago, mostly at schools, filled with orderly lines of voters in the morning hours.First-time voter Samanta Paredes, 30, in Santiago's historic downtown, said she hoped voting would proceed calmly and create a middle-road path for Chile."I hope a more centered person wins, that the extremes don't win, because they're never good for anyone," she said.Law graduate German Rojas, 33, also said he hoped the election could create a spirit of unity, rather than polarisation."I'm not clear if one option or another has a better chance. But I hope that whoever wins has the capacity that Chile needs."Polls are expected to close at 6pm, but will remain open if there are still voting lines. Initial results are expected quickly with a full count within hours.Crime and immigration have dominated the electoral agenda, a far cry from the wave of left-wing optimism and hopes of drafting a new constitution that brought current President Gabriel Boric, who isn't allowed to run for reelection, to power.Even as they left their local polling stations on Sunday, candidates nodded to pledges to fight crime."People who would like to go out to see friends or go to the movies don't dare to because of crime. We have too much to do," Matthei told reporters.Another shift from the previous election is a mandatory vote for the 15.7mn registered voters. The previous election saw an abstention rate of 53% in the first-round vote and the large amount of apathetic or undecided residents set to cast ballots adds a wild card to the race."It's an unprecedented scenario we haven't lived through and it's playing out in a presidential election," said Guillermo Holzmann, a political analyst from the University of Valparaiso, who added the vote would be very difficult to predict, adding that polls in Argentina, Bolivia and Ecuador failed to predict recent results."(New voters) don't think in terms of left, right or center, they think in terms of what changes are needed and what will benefit them," he said.Most of Congress is also up for grabs, with the entirety of the 155-member lower house and 23 of the country's 50 Senate seats in contention.The governing leftist coalition currently has a minority in both chambers and right-wing majorities in both could set the stage for Congress and the presidency to be controlled by the right for the first time since the end of the Augusto Pinochet dictatorship in 1990.