The European Christian Political Movement (ECPM) continues to follow with great concern what is happening in Spain and we express our support to and alignment with our member party, Valores.

In the light of the Spanish prime minister’s backroom deal with the Catalan separatists regarding an amnesty law and the social unrest that followed, we join our member party Valores in calling for respect and protection of the Spanish Constitution and the rule of law in Spain. We denounce this undemocratic power grab by prime minister Pedro Sánchez.

The prime minister Sánchez’s deal with the Catalan separatists to grant them amnesty in return for their votes supporting his investiture as prime minister again (after having lost the elections in July) is shameful and a grave endangering of the separation of powers. The prime minister has called for a commission to be formed to revise the sentences given to the secessionists and possibly overturn them, thus weakening the power of the judiciary. The European Commission Justice Commissioner Didier Reynders sent a letter a few days ago to the Spanish government warning about exactly this aspect and pointing to Spain’s lack of progress on judiciary reforms.

“The deal between Sánchez and the separatists calls for the principle of 'lawfare' for all judicial decisions. This means that legal procedures could be used to intimidate an opponent. That is a troubling development. Just like the fact that amnesty is granted to the Catalan separatists. Not least because this could benefit separatists with ties to Russia. The European Parliament must speak out on this as soon as possible in a plenary debate and the European Commission must take action” said MEP Anja Haga.

This shameful deal caused thousands of people to protest in major cities of Spain against Sanchez and his socialist party (PSOE), sometimes resulting in violence.

“This chaos created by the socialists led by Pedro Sánchez proves that he would do anything to hold onto power, even violating the Spanish Constitution or destroying the unity of the country”, added MEP Cristian Terheș, while MEP Márton Gyöngyösi warned that “by appeasing separatists, Sánchez is endangering Spain’s unity and its democratic achievements of the past fifty years.”

Together with our member party Valores and its President Alfonso Galdon Ruiz we call for the protests to remain calm and peaceful and for people to refrain from derogatory, inflammatory language and from physical violence.