The amnesty law passes a new stage today, but not without its last-minute setbacks. The text, not yet closed, is pending last-minute modifications before going through the plenary session of the Congress of Deputies. This is not a definitive procedure because there is still the tortuous process in the Senate, but today’s vote, which must pass by an absolute majority of 176 votes as it is an organic law, will establish the text that will most likely end up being approved within a few months.
Junts is forcing the text to undergo a last-minute modification, through an amendment that is still alive and that ERC also defends. This is the transactional amendment on 29 proposed by Junts, in which the term “terrorism” is intended to disappear among the exclusions of the amnesty.
The amendment specifies that “acts that have manifestly and with direct intention caused serious violations of human rights (…)” are excluded from the amnesty. However, they seek to modify the current text which states that acts classified as terrorist crimes are excluded from the amnesty as long as they violate articles 2 and 3 of the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms. Junts has already warned that if the PSOE does not support this amendment it will vote against the law.
If the party led by Carles Puigdemont from Belgium decided at the last moment to vote against the law promoted by themselves, the text would have to return to the Justice Commission, to go through the presentation process again and then vote in the Commission. Within this period of one month, the parties can once again present amendments and compromises in new negotiations between parliamentary groups.
On November 13, 2023, the socialists presented a proposal for the amnesty law. He did it alone and three days before Pedro Sánchez’s inauguration after negotiating for months with the independence parties as a bargaining chip to achieve his support for his re-election as President of the Government.
Until the last moment they were negotiating the fine print of the proposal. Even so, once the legislative process was registered and started, the text has undergone modifications through ten amendments. Eight of them, more of a technical nature, were negotiated between socialists, Sumar and independentists in the presentation phase. Two others, of more political significance, were produced during the Justice Commission through transactional amendments, one on the scope of terrorism as an exception to the law and another on how to apply the amnesty in precautionary measures.
The reason for his efforts is called Manuel García-Castellón and the Democratic Tsunami case. At the beginning of November, the PSOE had practically closed a text agreed upon with the independentists. Initially, the agreement stated that causes of terrorism, within the framework of the process, in which there were victims of injuries or fatalities, were excluded from the amnesty. In this way, those accused of terrorism by the National Court linked to the CDR remained within the law.
Some negotiators from Junts and ERC were not entirely sure of endorsing this text because there was an open case for terrorism due to the riots in Catalonia in response to the ruling of the Supreme Court process on October 14, 2019. The matter was dormant but remained open four years later.
The judge of the Audiencia Nacional Manuel García-Castellón issued an order on November 6 imputing the former president of the Generalitat Carles Puigdemont and the general secretary of ERC Marta Rovira for terrorism as coordinators of the Democratic Tsunami platform.
That forced negotiations and modified the initial text to leave only those cases of terrorism by final sentence as exceptions to the amnesty. Given that the Tsunami matter was still in the investigation phase, it was almost impossible for it to not even be prosecuted, much less with a final sentence, that is, without the option of appeal.
A week after the presentation of the text, the judge made another move to refer the matter to the Supreme Court when Puigdemont found himself incapacitated due to his status as a MEP. If the matter were taken up by the high court, it would be a single instance, without the option of appeal and therefore the deadlines to achieve a final ruling would be considerably shortened although legal sources deny that in no case would it be possible even for the opening of proceedings to be issued. oral trial in this period.
Given the suspicions that the justice system would accelerate the process against Puigdemont for terrorism, in the middle of the parliamentary process, Junts and ERC managed to make a new modification to withdraw the exception of a “final sentence” and return to terrorism as an exception whenever the right to freedom is violated. life and torture.
In this way, the independentistas believe that they are more protected against García-Castellón. However, this has included as a victim a French tourist who died of natural causes during the Prat riots on November 14, 2019 as a protest against the procés ruling.
