A new cycle of protests has begun in the prisons of the Spanish State, according to La Directo. More than four years ago a group of prisoners and prisoners was organized and began to coordinate with the outside world to try to recover the fighting community that emerged at the end of the 1970s by the Prisoners of War Coordinator (COPEL). Different social actors were then involved: incarcerated persons, families, lawyers, support groups and civil society organisations.

Regardless of the distances and the current context, the protest actions that have taken place since July 2016, both inside and outside the walls, aim to denounce and make visible "the continuous violations of fundamental rights", according to people. For this reason, they decided to create a list of demands that would collect fourteen specific points, which they show in each act of protest. The aim of most of the demands is for the General Secretariat of Penitentiary Institutions to respect and apply the articles provided for in the Penitentiary Regulations and the Penal Code, such as the release of persons with serious or incurable diseases and their equivalence with the health system of any other person. The European institutions are also calling for measures such as that of the Council of Europe, which determines the time limit a person can pass in isolation, which in no case should exceed fifteen days for psychological damage. They denounce that the conditions they suffer "threaten their own lives."

The last hunger strike began on 1 May and lasted for fifteen days. After that, there was little follow-up and a lack of coordination and communication between the parties involved in the event. In recent months, there has been a great deal of dialogue and debate between prisoners and the groups that support the street to try to design a common strategy. Its aim is to achieve greater impact and to increase the community to combat prisons. However, they have difficulty in establishing effective communication with colleagues from outside, as most of the people involved in the proposal are held in first grade and the General Secretariat of Penitentiary Institutions has their letters. For this reason, it has finally been decided to repeat the model of action of September last year: ten days of fasting to shifts in prisons. In other words, every ten days a person will start a hunger strike in another prison in the Spanish state. Once the person completes the action, another colleague or colleague will start entering another prison. Thus, the protest action is prolonged in time, and more prisoners could be summoned in the coming months. At the moment, with the participation of 15 people who have confirmed their participation, the action would be extended until at least the end of January.

Fourteen point table

The main objective of the action is to give visibility to the fourteen point table, and on this occasion they want to pay special attention to the punitive measures that directly affect the deterioration of the health of prisoners: the first degrees and isolation cells, which remain closed until 22 hours. Most “suicides” occur on the spot. On the other hand, the focus has also been on dispersion, in which it is confirmed that there are mistreatment and torture and the lack of adequate spaces for the presence of people with mental health problems, over seventy years of age or people with severe diseases.

On-site from Estremera

The action began this Tuesday in the isolation department of the Estremera prison (Madrid VII), where Toni Chavero is detained. Chavero has expressed its determination to take the fight to the end so that its rights and freedoms are not constantly suppressed: "I encourage you to raise your voice and denounce what happens in jail, and don't let yourself fall into silence, which is what jails want and what they want in jails." Hermenegildo Alexis, from the prison of Daroca (Zaragoza), reflects in his last letter, as a protest, on the usefulness of hunger strikes: "I think strikes are an effective instrument of pressure, but the cost is high, the media blur it so it doesn't reach the majority of the population. I think it is really important that the media should be placed in prisons in order to spread the reality of prisoners. "In the jails there is a lot of conformism," Alexis regretted, but it is clear that this reality must be addressed: "Sometimes it's the minorities that change things or push things a lot, because things change. It is often better to go slowly and build on the road”, added lehendakari.

Offline and with restricted communications

Since 25 August, the persons received and their families have carried out the removal of live visas as a result of a decision by the SGIP for allegedly preventing the spread of COVID-19 within the centres. The prisons in Catalonia were already banned on 21 July by the National Police. Human rights protection groups, families and institutions consider this decision "absurd" because officials enter and leave each day, work permits are given to inmates, graduate degrees are given and external professionals are introduced to workshops. The Association of Families of Prisoners of Catalonia has denounced that "the fact of not seeing relatives, couples or friends, and suffering a small affection, has very harsh consequences for the people welcomed, who are very nervous, as they spent four months without visas and now, again, they do not know when they will recover them".

On the other hand, although voiced communications (via glass) are authorised by the SGIP, the Support Group for Persons Adopted in Lleida has denounced the arbitrary decisions of the management of several centres: "We exchanged last week in Daroca prison to communicate with a prisoner and were told that, if we were from Catalonia, we didn't have to come, because we couldn't or communicate. According to lawyer Lisandro Giordani, this decision "cannot be taken by the prison management without the mandate of the SGIP, so it would be a further violation of the fundamental rights of persons deprived of their liberty".