Some updates on the latest news of Spain’s repression of Catalonia, as of October 3rd 2019.
Last week, 9 people were arrested with no warrant for the reason of being accused of belonging to a CDR (Comitè de Defensa de la República, Catalan for “Committee in Defense of the Republic”). These are ordinary people, not known activists or politicians or anything of that sort. CDRs have no leaders, so the police go after random people to spread fear, it could have been you or me.
What are CDRs? CDRs are horizontal grassroot organizations of people who want to fight for Catalonia to be an independent republic, based on the model of the soviets, which were first created to make possible the October 1st 2017 independence referendum. Every town or neighbourhood has a CDR, and thousands and thousands of people are organized in them. Everyone who believes in an independent Catalonia / Catalan Countries, stands against monarchy, fascism, sexism, racism, etc can join by just showing up to the assemblies. They organize protests, fundraise for the defence and families of political prisoners and to donate to those who are arrested and fined for their activism, educate about your rights when you are arrested and how to identify police officers who engage in police brutality, among many other things.
The Spanish judicial system, as well as most Spanish media and even the government, considers CDRs to be a terrorist organization even though CDRs have never hurted anyone. The Spanish supreme court condemned the activists Jordi Cuixart and Jordi Sànchez to pre-trial jail (where they have already spent 2 years) with the excuse that “in this case, violence is metaphorical” so, as you see, Spain feels comfortable twisting the law however they want to jail anyone who disagrees, especially if they’re Catalan or Basque.
The arrested could not contact their families nor lawyers for 5 days
Two of the arrested were forced to have a lawyer given by the state, and were forbidden from having a lawyer from Alerta Solidària (the organization of lawyers who help people who were arrested for things related to the independentist and leftist fight) as the arrested and their families wanted. At least one of these two people were told by the cops that “if they didn’t collaborate, all their family would be arrested and beaten up”.
These arrests were done in illegal conditions (read them detailed here)
2 of the 9 people arrested were released hours later. The other 7 are in jail considered “terrorists”
The arrested were not allowed to talk to their lawyers nor their families, they were kidnapped by the police and for hours nobody knew where they were.
One of the arrested was interrogated for 7 hours straight, with no rest. Another was interrogated for 8 hours in one day.
Right-wing unionist politicians were quick to post on their social media that the arrested people “had bombs” (false).
There have been many demonstrations around all cities and towns of Catalonia asking for these people to be released
Around the same days, there have also been groups of Catalan people from the Tsunami Democràtic movement that have been occupying different banks that fund the Spanish government, accusing the bank of collaborating with the Spanish occupation of Catalonia and its repression of human rights (which is true). The protestors have been thrown away by the police.
Even more extra Spanish military police officers have been sent to Catalonia and they can be seen everywhere with their anti-riot vans, and in the past days police helicopters have often been flying low on Catalan cities.
Neo-nazi Spanish people, most notably Santiago Abascal (the leader of the fascist party Vox) have shown up to police headquarters to show their support to the police for jailing Catalan independentists.
The Spanish army has been walking around towns in Catalonia fully armed, including a group of at least 14 soldiers with machine guns who were seen and photographed drinking alcohol with their weapons. The photo went viral but there will be no consquences for the soldiers because according to the Spanish Army “the fact that they had beer is not a proof that they were drinking it”. Sure, Jan.
And I’ve probably forgotten important things because so much has been going on these past two weeks (and I was ill for one of them), so feel free to add to this post if you want to!
