The rubber balls threaten to poison again the negotiation to reform the ‘gag law’ | Spain

If the use of rubber balls by security forces to deal with street altercations was one of the discrepancies that caused the second attempt to reform the citizen security law, known as gag lawin the current legislature it is once again one of its great obstacles. Junts, Podemos and BNG – three of the parties that support the parliamentary majority of the Government and whose support is essential to carry out the modification of a law approved by the PP in 2015 – have presented amendments so that this anti-riot material is definitively prohibited. Two others, EH Bildu and ERC, also set a deadline for their elimination: one year from the reform coming into force.

Faced with them, the PSOE, its government partner, Sumar, and the PNV, the formation with which the socialists govern in the Basque Country, defend the creation of “specific” protocols for its use and the progressive replacement of this material “with others.” less harmful” but without setting a date for the latter, as can be seen from the detailed analysis of the 200 amendments that the different parliamentary groups presented on Tuesday to begin their debate in a parliamentary presentation. PP and Vox, who saw their entire amendments to the reform project overturned last week, flatly reject any limitation on the use of anti-riot material.

The amendments that show a more frontal rejection of rubber balls are those of Junts, Podemos and BNG. Carles Puigdemont’s party proposes that on December 31, 2025, “its total ban will become effective.” In the text justifying its amendment, the pro-independence party highlights that the initial proposal presented last October has “ambiguous wording, which does not imply any commitment and which refers to a ‘substitution’ that does not guarantee avoiding the dangers of bullets. eraser”. His position is not new. Already in the frustrated negotiation of the last legislature, Junts remained inflexible on this point. Their argument was that, in Catalonia, the Mossos d’Esquadra stopped using them in 2014 and they were replaced by bullets. foam, a viscoelastic material on less harmful paper. The big difference is that then their votes were not essential to carry out the reform and, on this occasion, they were.

Podemos does not set dates, but proposes that “the use of kinetic projectiles called rubber bullets or any other similar instrument or product that may cause serious injuries, losses, uselessness or deformity of organs or limbs, loss of of a sense or even death” at the same time that the law comes into force. In the previous legislature, Podemos was part of Unidas Podemos, a parliamentary group that in that frustrated negotiation maintained a less maximalist position and strove to bring together the positions between the different groups with alternative proposals on the most controversial points. On the issue of rubber balls, Unidas Podemos then proposed creating “within six months” a commission chaired by the Ombudsman with the mandate to prepare “an opinion on the disappearance of riot control material that could cause irreparable injuries.” . For its part, the BNG now proposes a prohibition on the use “by the State Security Forces and Corps of any throwing element likely to cause personal injury.”

EH BIldu and ERC also propose changes in a joint amendment with which they seek to set the maximum time to stop using it at one year. In its text, it wants the Ministry of the Interior to approve “within a maximum period of 6 months after the entry into force of this law” a schedule to replace the rubber balls within a period “not exceeding six months.” All of this, accompanied “by rigorous technical evaluation, clear use protocols and adequate training of security forces to guarantee an effective and safe transition.” In the previous legislature, both parties defended the ban without a transition period and, in fact, the failure of the negotiation at that time was largely caused by their refusal to make their position more flexible on this point.

The PSOE, PNV and Sumar – which in the previous legislature were part of Unidas Podemos – have maintained a good part of what they already proposed in the previous attempt to reform the gag law. Then they already talked about the need to develop “specific protocols in accordance with international standards” on the use of force and the use of riot control equipment to “always use the least harmful means for people and avoiding those that cause irreparable injuries.” Now they have added the progressive replacement of rubber balls “with less harmful ones”, although without setting dates. However, Yolanda Díaz’s training has presented an amendment in which it adds to this initial proposal some more requirements to these protocols, among them “the adequate and effective visual identification of the agents” who use it and that “the competent authorities must render annual accounts before the Congress of Deputies on their development and application.

The PNV – which has presented amendments to other points of the reform – proposed in the previous legislature to follow the model adopted by the Basque Executive after the death, on April 5, 2012, of the Athletic Bilbao fan Íñigo Cabacas after receiving in the head from the impact of one of these projectiles during the incidents recorded after a football match. That event resulted in a two-year prison sentence for the Ertzaintza commander who led the operation, and in the police area, with severe restrictions on the use of rubber balls. These are not formally prohibited, but since that event, more than 12 years ago, the Basque regional police have not fired any and have only used bullets. foamlike the mossos. The PSOE then did not contemplate in any case the elimination of riot control material, in line with what the Minister of the Interior, Fernando Grande-Marlaska, defended.

Police unions have repeatedly shown their rejection of the reform of the gag law and, specifically, to the removal of riot control material since they consider that this “would mean an operational loss” for the agents when they have to deal with violent street altercations. This has been, in fact, one of the main arguments they have used to demonstrate repeatedly in the streets in recent years with the changes in the law. On the contrary, social groups that are in favor of eliminating them use a June 2021 report from the Catalan association for the defense of human rights Iridia that ensures that, between the years 2000 and 2020, there were 26 people “affected” by the impact. straight from rubber balls. Of them, one died, the Athletic Bilbao fan. Another 15 suffered the disablement or loss of an organ, most of them the eyeball.