National Police agents file charges against citizens for their attempt to prevent the 1-O referendum declared illegal by the Constitutional Court.Manu Fernández (ap)
There is still no concrete proposal on the amnesty that the pro-independence parties can negotiate in Congress to vote on the inauguration of Pedro Sánchez, but one point is proving extremely sensitive. The question is whether this general pardon for the causes linked to the trial should also include the 45 agents who were indicted on serious police charges with which they tried to prevent illegal elections in several colleges and schools in Catalonia on October 1, 2017 . The unions The police are aware – “we are not an object of negotiation,” they repeat – while the Catalan political forces have contradictory positions.
The union representatives on the body criticize that it is an equation between those who violate the constitutional order and those who are obliged to restore the situation in Catalonia. A total of 45 police officers are awaiting trial, and most of them are accused of assault – some of them are also charged with crimes against moral integrity – for exceeding their duty to suppress 1-O. This includes local commanders who, according to the instructor, did nothing to prevent episodes of “unnecessary” and “unprovoked” violence.
The melon was opened a week ago in an interview with this newspaper by former MP Jaume Asens. The lawyer hired by the Sumar leadership is the bridge to Carles Puigdemont to try to enforce the amnesty, a condition set by both Junts and ERC to vote for Sánchez. “Normally, amnesties affect all parties to the conflict. “The border is crimes against humanity and there were none,” Asens said after addressing state security forces.
But the police are not so clear. “Their presumption of innocence is intact,” says Jacobo Rodríguez, spokesman for the SUP union, who also defends most of the investigators. “It was a five-year ordeal,” he explains of the police officers’ situation. Nevertheless, they assure that they are against the amnesty. “We trust in a free acquittal,” he emphasizes, criticizing the attempt to equate them with people “who have committed a crime and been convicted by the Supreme Court.”
The views on this sensitive issue are similar among other representatives of the National Police. “If anyone suffered back then, it was the police, who were cornered and vilified,” laments José María Benito, spokesman for the UFP union, who is confident that the accused officers will be acquitted. “We fear that there will be judges who will indict them,” he adds. And the idea that so far there is no “convicted police officer who can be amnestied” abounds. “It is quite serious to want to equate the executioners with the victims,” he concludes.
The general secretary of Jupol, Aarón Rivero, describes the government as “indecent” for “considering equating the actions of the National Police with those of the criminals involved in a coup in Catalonia.” In his opinion, it is another “lack of respect” that only leads to “a weakening of the image” of the police and a “damage to the principle of authority.” And he calls it “unbearable” that Yolanda Díaz “puts the criminals who tried to divide Spain with an illegal referendum in the same bag as the police officers who went there under a political order and in accordance with a court order He concludes that the agents complied with applicable laws and “should not be involved in any legal proceedings.”
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The issue is very sensitive within the Catalan population and therefore it is claimed that the parties are referring to the issue. It is much more important to know that we are at the gates of the Diada demonstration, organized by the National Assembly of Catalonia and which usually represents, on the streets, the benchmark for the acceptance of the postulates of independence. The first secretary of the Congressional Committee, Gerardo Pisarello, recalled last Friday on Catalunya Ràdio that although his party had filed complaints against these accusations from the Barcelona City Council, “above all” the “need for approval of the amnesty” must be at the forefront .”
All eyes are now on Puigdemont, who will hold a conference in Brussels tomorrow, Tuesday, and it will be the first occasion where an authorized voice from Junts will raise the possibility of an amnesty for the police officers and those responsible for the police allegations are, points out 1-O. There are also different voices in the ERC. “What is a crime is hitting voters.” No election. Therefore, an amnesty must first ensure that no one is prosecuted who has not committed a crime,” he said in an interview with La Vanguardia on Sunday. Yes, they firmly said no to the amnesty of the 1-O collective and criticized the leadership of Oriol Junqueras and Marta Rovira.
In addition, unions are suspicious of amnesty, regardless of the pardon that might be granted to the accused agents. “We see constitutional adjustment as difficult,” says SUP spokesman Jacobo Rodríguez. “There are two serious problems: the constitutional obligation to bobbin lace and the feeling of impunity that it may create in the future,” adds José María Benito of the SUP. “These negotiations represent a lack of respect for the hundreds of police officers injured in the riots in Catalonia in 2017 and 2019,” says Jupol’s Aarón Rivero.
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