Despites all the questions still surrounding the attack in Barcelona's Ciutadella park, Ciutadans (Cs) and PP have gone to the scene this Wednesday for a demonstration. Despite being planned as a way of showing support for "social harmony" and "non-violence", it ended up charged with tension which spilled over into violence. Shouts against the Mossos, TV3 and Carles Puigdemont, so the Catalan police, public TV channel and former president, were the most-repeated slogans among those attending, a few hundred people in total.
The demonstration had been called to criminalise the independence movement and accuse it of creating a "social fracture", with victims like the woman attacked on Saturday. Earlier today, the alleged attacker was arrested by Spanish National Police before being released on bail and under a restraining order by a judge.
Photo: Sergi Alcàzar
Two moments of particularly high tension were seen. The first was when a Telemadrid camera operator was rebuked and attacked by the crowd, incorrectly believing he had a yellow loop on his camera. They accused him of being from TV3 instead of Telemadrid. The journalist was punched four times and had to leave the scene.
The second centred around a person who went up to the park's gates and shouted "fascists out". They were surrounded and insulted by the demonstrators and were kicked a number of times. Barcelona's Urban Guard had to escort them away.
Cs have condemned the attack against the journalist, which they attribute to an individual "infiltrated from a radical group unconnected to the organisation". They've called on police to identify the individual in question.
Photo: Sergi Alcàzar
Far right
As well as Cs and PP supporters, also visible were far-right activists, including members of Generation Identity, a new pan-European far-right movement.
The gathering also saw chants against TV3 and the Mossos d'Esquadra. "Where were you on 1st October?", went one, referring to last year's independence referendum. "Puigdemont to prison," was another.
Photo: Sergi Alcàzar
Ciutadans' role
Ciutadans is the party which has claimed the most attention since Saturday, and the same was true this Wednesday. The victim's husband a member of the unionist party, and now they're using the case to attack the independence movement. The party's leaders, Albert Rivera and Inés Arrimadas, had already appeared this morning in the small town of Alella, just north of Barcelona, "cleaning up" yellow loops in the face of what they call the "inaction" of Pedro Sánchez's government.
In comments to the press before the rally, Rivera blamed Quim Torra's Catalan government for the "social fracture" leading to attacks like that last Saturday. Arrimadas said that, in this case, unlike that of photojournalist Jordi Borràs: "I've seen it ridiculed, downplayed and said that it wasn't for political reasons".
For PP, former Spanish minister Dolors Montserrat was the most senior representative, and she directly pointed the blame at Madrid: "Pedro Sánchez is the friend and accomplice of the independence movement, of Torra and Puigemont". "We have a passive Spanish government, responsible for having omitted and neglected its role. It's abandoned us to the fortune of the independence movement," she added.
Notably absent were PSC, the other large unionist party and Catalan branch of Sánchez's PSOE. From the very start they had distanced themselves from today's event.
Photo: Sergi Alcàzar
Alleged attacker arrested
Today's demonstration was called after a woman was attacked in the same park on Saturday whilst her children picked up yellow loops and threw them on the floor. According to the Mossos d'Esquadra, who took statements at the time, there was no political motive.
The woman filed a complaint yesterday with the Spanish Police. Officers arrested the alleged attacker this morning. They were released on bail this afternoon by a judge, under a restraining order.