In November, it was reported that preventive detention will be extended by another three months to journalist Pablo González and at the end of this month will be held in custody in Poland, which was arrested last February near the border with Ukraine, where he was working as a journalist. Since then they have been incommunicado and have not allowed him to contact his relatives or his trusted attorney, with a single visit throughout this time. "What we have been able to gather from communications between relatives is that they remain in a precarious situation and are suffering physically remarkably; that they lack cold, hunger and minimal needs", added the Socialist Council of Busturialdea.

González is from Nabarniz (Bizkaia), so the Socialist Council of Busturialdea called the protest the same month of March to call for the release of the journalist. He is now again calling for action: a demonstration has been organised in Gernika (Bizkaia) on 23 December in defence of González' freedom and right to information and against NATO. The mobilization will begin at 19:30 from Plaza de Mercurio.

Right to information during war

"Since the outbreak of the war in Ukraine, the imperialist bloc of the West has tried to impose a unique thought of its interest throughout the world, especially through the strengthening of NATO in the European Union," explained the members of the Socialist Council of Busturialdea. "The aim is to maintain the position of this geopolitical bloc on the global market. For this, media manipulation and the interested use of information have been the daily bread since the beginning of the war", he recalled: "The right to information in society is repeatedly violated in the European Union and attempts have been made to normalise censorship and harassment."

All of this has linked the imprisonment of González as "an attack on freedom of expression, the right to information and criticity". "Similarly, these types of cases pretend to be an example of harassment for attitudes like fear," they point out.

Armed and totalitarianism

The Socialist Council has denounced that NATO, as the "military leadership of western oligarchies, separates the death from barbarism", "with all impunity", "especially in peripheral countries". "At stake in this war is the division of the world between the factions of the bourgeoisie and the loser is the proletarianism," he warns. Thus, he recalls the general budgets recently approved in the Spanish state, noting that economic planning is "warrior and militarist": "Defence spending has increased by 25%, and the leftist parties, in addition to approving these budgets, support the State of Ukraine, justifying its relationship with fascism and thus opening the way to the rise of fascism."

The Socialist Council, for its part, stated that "the farce of the democratic nature of the European Union has been revealed": "Taking war, terrorism or pandemic as an excuse, totalitarian tendencies have been taken with impunity by ruling states and elites." Specifically, it has denounced the application of "dictatorial measures" in times of crisis, such as the "normalization of police persecution, prohibitions of political militancy, measures to increase social control, investments in military technology", etc.

"There is no bourgeois state that permits the political rights of the proletariat or that accepts the dissemination of information that may compromise the interests of the Capital," concluded the members of the Socialist Council: "The only real front against imperialist wars will be the internationally organized proletariat.