Before and after the CIA

Despite everything, the most often repeated criticism is that, unfortunately, in Catalonia the tragedy is being used for electoral ends, and the police as a political instrument

Mònica Planas
2 min

On Friday, the Spanish morning TV shows on Antena 3, Cuatro, and Telecinco continued roasting the Mossos and the Generalitat with aggravated hostility. From a television perspective, the role of the anti-terror warning (now in the supposedly "original" version printed by El Periódico) allegedly received by the Mossos has taken on a new dimension. The photocopy became the permanent backdrop on screen, and its mere exhibition makes it appear forcefully true. One could say that it is the key visual evidence that the attacks could have been averted.

What is the before and after of this document in discussions on Spanish television?

1. Before this document, the Mossos were accused of excluding Spanish security forces from the investigations, even blocking their access to specific areas such as the home that blew up in Alcanar. They were denouncing the risk that this involves for public safety, assuming that it is the Spanish police that have the key information on jihadist matters. Once the warning notice was published in El Periódico, this idea was cast aside and the role of the Spanish security forces disappeared completely, as if they didn't exist. Nobody mentions them. The news focus on responsibility in questions of security now falls solely and exclusively on the Mossos.

2. Before this document, the Mossos' refusal to collaborate with Spanish security forces was criticized, when the latter could guarantee access to several international law enforcement agencies. After the document, it turned out that the links between the Mossos and the CIA run deep, and even include routine collaboration. It is highly suspicious that some courses that the Catalan police are supposed to have periodically attended at the Virginia headquarters of the CIA reinforce this theory.

3. Before this document in El Periódico, all of the morning programs were focused on the terror cell in Ripoll and the town was invaded by reporters. Afterward, nothing has been heard of the imam Es Satty. Not one program has spoken of the investigations of Es Satty ordered by judge Garzón in 2007, nor the telephone taps done by Spain’s Guardia Civil in 2008, nor of the report prepared by Madrid’s Audiencia Nacional Court. This is surprising, considering that Es Satty was the brains of the operation. Also disappearing from TV studios was the image of the Sagrada Família that for a few days was the true objective of the attacks.

4. Puigdemont, Forn, and Trapero have become a single unit. Their statements in press conferences and interviews have been taken out of context so as to extract the fragments in which they deny the warnings from the CIA to the Mossos, and they have been presented as a political front that lies to the Catalan people. Trapero has come to be seen as a man who works for the interests of the independence process.

Despite everything, the most often repeated criticism is that, unfortunately, in Catalonia the tragedy is being used for electoral ends, and the police as a political instrument.

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