October 1 police violence not “excessive” despite 1,000 injured, Spanish minister says

The Spanish foreign minister, Alfonso Dastis, said the violence execised by the Spanish police during the October 1 referendum was not “excessive”. Although the Catalan Health Department published a report stating that the violence caused 1,066 citizens injured, Dastis justified the violence to the German media corporation Deutsche Welle saying that the people “were preventing the police from doing what they should be doing.”

Besides, he claimed that use of batons, tear gas and other weapons was “a reaction to provocations from people who prevented them from discharging the mandates they had received from courts.” Alfonso Dastis was involved in a controversy last month after denying the veracity of some of the October 1 police violence footage in an interview to the BBC.

When being emphasized that “people were thrown to each other” and that even elderly people were involved, Dastis played the issue down. “Come on, this kind of accidents occur.” After being insisted on the matter, he said that he does not think that the October 1 violence “was by any means a Bloody Sunday.” Yet he admitted that he has not read reports by NGOs such as Human Rights Watch, which stated that Spain’s police used “excessive force.”