Nicola Sturgeon to chair event on witches at brand new Scottish festival
She'll be joined by a famous friend for the event
WITCH OUT Nicola Sturgeon to chair event on witches at brand new Scottish festival
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NICOLA Sturgeon will be hoping to leave her audience spellbound as she chairs an event on WITCHES next month.
The former First Minister will explore Scotland's witch trials, described as one of the darkest chapters in the country's history, at the first-ever Dundee Book Festival.
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Her author pal Val McDermid will open the festival with her band
Credit: PA
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Witches being hanged during the witchcraft trials of 1661
Credit: Alamy
She will attend the event with pal Val McDermid - who will open the festival with her band of crime authors The Fun Lovin' Crime Writers.
The ex-SNP leader will chair the headline witches show on Saturday evening on June 14.
Ms Sturgeon will be joined on stage by Claire Mitchell KC and Zoe Venditozzi who are the founders of Witches of Scotland campaign.
It comes after a campaign was launched five years ago to get a legal pardon for the estimated 2,500 people - the vast majority of them women - who were executed under Scotland's Witchcraft Act between the 16th and 18th Centuries.
In 2022, when she was First Minister at the time, Ms Sturgeon marked International Women's Day by apologising for the thousands of women executed or convicted of being witches in Scotland hundreds of years ago.
She insisted it was important to acknowledge that "injustice on a colossal scale" had taken place which she said was driven "at least in part" by misogyny.
The law was was in force from 1563 until 1736 - a period when witch hunts took place in many countries.
However, academics reckon Scotland's execution rate was five times the European average.
Under the brutal regime, confessions were secured under torture and "witches" were strangled and their body burnt.
Opening a Holyrood debate on IWD at the time, Ms Sturgeon said: "At a time when women were not even allowed to speak as witnesses in a court room, they were accused and killed because they were poor, different, vulnerable, or in many cases just because they were women."
Inside 'Cave of the Devil' with 'blood-smeared walls where witches cast spells'
The former First Minister has even been branded a witch herself in previous years.
During the pandemic, a cheeky five-year-old went viral when she called Ms Sturgeon a "wee witch" after coronavirus restrictions ruined her sleepover plans.
Youngster Freya was left gutted after house visits were banned in Glasgow, West Dunbartonshire and East Renfrewshire.
It meant the schoolgirl was unable to go to her friend Ceci's house for her first ever sleepover.
In the video, Freya said: "Nicola Sturgeon, how dare you.
"I could go to my friend Ceci's party. I've got a sleepover at Ceci's at the weekend and I'm going to it.
"I'm not cancelling. Wee witch."
The Dundee Book Festival will run from Thursday, June 12 until Sunday, June 15 in a number of different venues across the city.
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