The spokesperson for the Basque Government, Maria Ubarretxena, has assured that the Executive is "attentive" to the call disseminated on social media by Blocus, a movement that has carried out violent acts in France and Barcelona, fearing that altercations could be repeated after the incidents recorded last Monday in Bilbao.
In an interview granted to Radio Euskadi and collected by Europa Press, Maria Ubarretxena stressed that the regional government works "with great seriousness, with great responsibility" in the face of disturbances that left serious damage in the Biscayan capital, where radicals committed riots with "the excuse" of an act by the agitator Vito Quiles, which ultimately did not take place.
"We are very attentive to these calls, especially given that any excuse, any pretext, is now valid to generate this type of altercation, which ultimately involves looting businesses, mistreating society, urban furniture, and exercising violence without any justification," stated the spokesperson for the Basque Executive.
Message from Pradales and defense of authority
The spokesperson has adopted the message conveyed by the lehendakari, Imanol Pradales, to society regarding "the lack" of respect for authority, and has defended that "the Ertzaintza" must also be protected, the Basque Police responsible for protecting the citizens of Euskadi.
Ubarretxena insisted that Monday's events showed that "any excuse is valid to provoke and for the use of violence." In that sense, she stressed that "we have to say loud and clear that no objective, no excuse is valid to justify, to legitimize the use of violence."
"That cannot be accepted in any way under any pretext," she added, while calling for a collective reflection, "as a society," from "families, from schools, from the Government itself and from society itself."
A frontal rejection of violence
For the spokesperson of the Basque Government, "there is no excuse, no objective, nor is there any end that justifies it." Furthermore, she considered that the visit of "a professional provocateur who did not even appear" was used as a pretext, although, despite this, "disturbances and violence that were totally out of place" occurred.
Ubarretxena described what happened as "a worrying event" and warned that there is a lack of respect for authority. "We live in a country where, unfortunately, we know what it is to suffer violence in our own flesh in different aspects, not only physical violence, but also social coercion, a certain social pressure and a certain law of silence and 'omertà'. That also comes in our history, in our DNA," she pointed out.
In that context, she defended that Basque society has learned "a lot" from its history and warned that "this cannot happen again." She also focused on the role of the Ertzaintza, an institution that, she said, has sometimes been questioned, something that, in her opinion, should not be accepted.
"Our Basque police is ours, it is the Ertzaintza, it is the Police that protects us, and I believe that we also have to legitimize their role," she stressed. The spokesperson added that it is "a democratic Police" that is there to protect Basques and the "right of citizens to be able to move and live freely."