The Council of Europe once again puts Spain in a bind. A new report prepared by the Legal Affairs and Human Rights Commission, led by the Dutch Pieter Omtzigt, demands that the Spanish Government clarify as soon as possible the use of Pegasus, Candiru and other spy software and urges it to provide all the information necessary to the Venice Commission in three months. Furthermore, the text that was approved this morning puts Spain in the same bag as Azerbaijan, Poland, Hungary and Greece for the use of these espionage systems.
The documentation approved today in Paris is still subject to amendments and should be voted on again in a plenary session of the Assembly of the Council of Europe (between October 9 and 13) for final approval.
The report emphasizes the idea that the Spanish authorities, after the use of Pegasus that caused Catalangate was uncovered in March 2022, have still not delivered sufficient elements that, for example, the European Parliament requested at the beginning of 2023 The speakers express their concern and warn that the use of spy programs should be limited to “really serious crimes”, such as terrorism. Likewise, the Council of Europe asks that Spain refrain from using the national security or official secrets law to deny access to information to victims.
For the Legal Affairs and Human Rights Commission, up to 65 cases of espionage have been demonstrated after Citizen Lab’s investigation and it warns that if its use is motivated to discredit political opponents and silence them, there is a violation of human rights.
The speakers ask Spain to carry out a complete and determined investigation and to report it in three months to the Venice Commission, a consultative body of the Council of Europe on constitutional matters that helps States adapt their legal and institutional structures to standards. Europeans.
This report is added to the one approved in 2021 by the Council of Europe itself. In this case it was directed by the Latvian Boris Cilevi?s and questioned freedom of expression in Spain, considering the crimes of rebellion and sedition as “obsolete and excessively broad to address what is truly a political problem that must be resolved by political means.” , and invited the Government of Pedro Sánchez to “pardon or release from prison the Catalan politicians convicted for their role in organizing the unconstitutional referendum of October 2017” and to “consider the possibility of abandoning extradition procedures against politicians living in abroad and who are wanted for the same reasons”. A subsequent follow-up report was vetoed after the PSOE and the PP joined.
As far as Pegasus is concerned, the Government’s reaction resulted in the resignation of the then director of the National Intelligence Center (CNI) Paz Esteban. But the investigative commission on Pegasus was vetoed in Congress and the declassification of documents promised by Moncloa, as long as a judge requested it, has not occurred. Furthermore, at a legal level, several of the victims have filed lawsuits before the courts, although they are making slow progress.
The senator and only pro-independence member of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, Laura Castel, in the ranks of ERC, highlights the importance of the report “because it places Spain at the same level as countries such as Azerbaijan, Hungary and Poland”, and because , as he said, adds pressure “on the Spanish State to carry out an effective investigation into Catalangate.”
