Spain's amnesty for Catalan independence process cases is a step closer to becoming law. After the agreement between the Socialists (PSOE), Together for Catalonia (Junts) and the Republican Left (ERC), the justice committee of the lower house has approved the four amendments altering the text and also passed the new "skeleton" of the draft text: 20 votes in favour (the PSOE, Sumar, ERC, Junts, Bildu, the PNV and Podemos) and 17 votes against (the PP and Vox). The pro-independence parties withdrew their own amendments, dating from a month ago, and, in this way, the only text that remains alive is that of the new draft, which will be voted on and validated in the full Congress next Thursday, March 14th. The modifications that have been agreed by the three parties affect, fundamentally, the actions classified as crimes of terrorism, high treason and misuse of funds, which are now defined using "European standards". In terrorism, the reference to the Spanish Penal Code is removed and the European directive on terrorism is alluded to, high treason is framed in the Charter of the United Nations and in a resolution of the General Assembly of the UN and misuse of funds is included as long as it has not resulted in "enrichment".
The justice committee opened its session a few minutes after eleven and the People's Party (PP) took 25 seconds to interrupt it. The PP general secretary, Cuca Gamarra, complained that they had learned from the media of the "extra-parliamentary agreements" that modify the wording of the proposed law - agreements signed by three political parties with representation in Congress and distributed to the parliamentary groups when the session began. Gamarra asked that the committee's procedural body, the Bureau, consider the status of the amendments and that, if considered appropriate, the committee meeting be suspended so that the parties had time to study them. The committee chair, Francisco Lucas, decided to take a "short break" and, after half an hour, the sitting resumed. Vox insisted that the bill should not have returned to the justice committee and appealed to the Constitutional Court to stop the committee session. The Bureau was not in agreement with either the PP or Vox and the speaking turns thus began.
Junts assumed the cost "on its own", but now has "shared the benefits"
On behalf of Junts, Josep Maria Cervera underlined "the exigency and attitude" of his party: "An exigency that many did not want to know about, either here or in Catalonia, and an attitude that they greatly underestimated". For Junts, the previously draft "had important shortcomings, was improvable and needed to be reinforced", which led them to vote 'no' because they had "reasons to do so". "We have for weeks borne, all alone, the cost of our 'no', which now allows us to share with everyone the benefits of the best possible amnesty law", he exclaimed, and celebrated a "collective act of generosity by all” which has only been “possible” because Junts “stood its ground despite the pressure”.
Cervera stressed that the amendments passed today make it possible to "make it more difficult for those who want to abuse it" and guarantee a law "compatible with international law" and "prepared for its European consideration and compatibility". Cervera said that "not surrendering and maintaining one's efforts make more sense than ever because they allow us to give a message of hope to absolutely all the people who have faced [Spanish state] retaliation".
ERC says the amnesty "could be stopped now, as before"; it also includes everybody "now, as before"
Pilar Vallugera, from ERC, regretted that the parliamentary processing was "a month and a half late" and pointed out that "some of the trials that have been opened and some of the convictions could have been spared". For the ERC deputy, the previous draft was as good as the one that has now emerged from the PSOE-Junts-ERC pact: "Unassailable texts do not exist with this judiciary. The text we have now is as unassailable like the one we had before, this law can be stopped now as before, and it includes all the people facing retaliation, now as before", she argued. She added that there had indeed been an improvement with regard to misuse of funds and asserted that "if someone feels more comfortable with this definition or this wording", referring to Junts, her party would "collaborate, pull it forward, as it did for four years, and it won't prevent it from applying to all the people”. She highlighted the value of "demonstrating to the state that it cannot carry out repression with impunity" and acknowledged that it is necessary to be aware that the application of the amnesty "will not be left in the hands of the legislators, but in the hands of the judges".
Regarding this, Pilar Vallugera was very clear that the amnesty is "a first case" and "it will not be the last". ERC is advocating a "return to a point where the independence movement is strong enough to achieve the liberation of the people" and "move forward together again to a horizon of freedom" for Catalonia "through a 'self-determination referendum'. Finally, she demanded that when the amnesty returns to Congress after the Senate round, it should be defended "in terms of the country [Catalonia] and the independence movement".
PP view: "The new amendments make what was already bad, worse”
The PP speaker on the new amnesty draft was Cuca Gamarra, who criticised the PSOE, Junts and ERC for having managed to “make what was already bad even worse” with amendments that make the amnesty law “more illegal and more unconstitutional”: “It had little of impeccability at the beginning and nothing of impeccability at the end.” The Popular Party general secretary accused the PSOE of trying to "disconnect the [pro-independence] coup plotters from the Spanish rule of law", of granting an amnesty to "the most serious crimes that exist in democracy" and of having its power "inextricably linked to corruption."
On the other hand, the parties backing the Spanish government praised and defended the law. Francisco Aranda, of the Catalan Socialists (PSC), maintained that the amnesty seeks to fix what the PP "helped to ruin" to "light up the enthusiasm of the rest of Spain." The bill takes a step to “contributing decisively to social coexistence.” For his part, Gerardo Pisarello, from Catalunya en Comú (within Sumar), asserted the need to reform the definition of terrorism in the Spanish Penal Code and stressed that the new legislation will restrict judges who have an “excessive sense” of partisanship and who compromised their “impartiality and independence” due to their “vindictive obsession” with the Catalan independence process.