MADRID –  The city council in Spain’s northern city of Pamplona has called for an investigation into crimes committed against its residents by the former dictatorship of late Gen. Francisco Franco, making it the first town known to take such action.

The resolution adopted Friday urges the city hall to file a criminal case in Pamplona’s courts, which would then decide whether to begin an investigation.

Spain has never officially investigated alleged crimes committed under Franco, whose troops rose up against the republican Spanish government in 1936 to start the Spanish Civil War.

The motion said some 300 Pamplona residents were killed at the outbreak of the war, which ushered in some 40 years of dictatorship.

Civic groups say some 130,000 people killed under Franco are still unaccounted for.