Spanish authorities had denied the protestors the right to gather, a few days after the parliament controversially approved the so-called “Gag Law” that heavily limits the rights to gather and protest in public spaces.
“Over the past weeks we have seen a series of repressive actions that seem to be aimed at intimidating social movements and organized citizens before the approval of the Gag Law,” stated the nong-governmental organization Legal Sol Commission, which was founded after the Indignados movement in 2011. This movement was a popular uprising protesting against austerity measures and governmental corruption.
About a thousand people participated in Wednesday’s march, according to the online news website Diagonal, in the capital Madrid, but also in Grenade, Barcelona, and other cities.
The gathering remained peaceful until the police forces intervened and launched the assault on the protestors, causing about 30 injured according to the organizers
Through Operation Piñata, launched by the police against the Coordinated Groups of Anarchists (GAC), 38 people have been arbitrarily arrested, including five imprisoned without bail on Wednesday.
In late December, a Spanish judge sentenced seven of the 11 arrested anarchists to prison without bail for allegedly belonging to “terrorist cells,” which provoked massive protests in across the country.
The Sol Legal Commission denounced the police procedures and their inaccurate labeling of evidence and circumstances, as they referred to mere camping gas bottles as “explosives,” to self-managed associations as “terrorist groups,” and as attempts of self-defense before police abuses as “guerrilla tactics.”
Since the approval of the “Gag Law,” which will come to force in July, any demonstration that takes place outside parliament, or other buildings which provide “basic public services,” will be considered illegal, regardless of their nature, and their participants will risk fines equivalent to about US$660,000), among other measures.
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