This Europe: Friars remember first human rights activist

A handful of Dominican friars will gather this evening in an old Sevillian church to set on the road to sainthood Bartolome de las Casas, a local priest who sailed withconquistadors but who turned against them to become the first and fiercest critic of Spanish colonialism in the New World.

Fray Bartolome wrote a passionate denunciation of the genocidal cruelty inflicted upon indigenous Americans in the reckless pursuit of gold. His Account of the Destruction of the Indies of 1542 was banned by the Inquisition, not because it was untrue but because it said "cruel and fierce things about Spanish soldiers". Still a blistering read after 460 years, the Sevillian priest's reportage makes him the world's first human rights campaigner, according to his supporters. He once refused to administer the last rites to a colonial landowner until the dying man agreed to free his indigenous slaves.

"Fray Bartolome was a prophet of our times, sensitive to the injustices and marginalisation of the downtrodden," says Padre Herminio de Paz Castano, of Seville's Dominican community, which requested canonisation two years ago. "His ideas are utterly timely. The problems of racism and the marginalisation of immigrants land on our doorstep every day," Fr Herminio said yesterday.

De las Casas was nine when he sailed with his father on Columbus's second voyage to America, fired with enthusiasm. But he railed against the horrors he witnessed. "I have seen with my own eyes these gentle, peaceful people subjected to the most inhuman cruelties that have ever been committed by generations of cruel and barbaric men, and for no other reason than insatiable greed, the hunger and thirst for gold on the part of our own people."

Canonisation is long overdue, Fr Herminio says. "He's our brother, a free spirit who achieved glory."