The Reformist Police Group (ARP), a non-majority union, has requested the transfer of the National Police Headquarters in Catalonia, located at Via Laietana 43, considering that they occupy a “building inherited from Francoism.” This is the first police support for the facilities to convert the building into a memory center for the repression, as the pro-independence parties have demanded.
In a statement, the progressive union assures that the building occupied by the Police Headquarters was “where there were episodes of arrests, illegal demonstrations, torture and deaths on some occasions, caused by members of the police in the service of the dictatorship.” “In Via Laietana 43, the civil and human rights of citizens were violated. There is no doubt that this building is part of the black history of the institution,” they add from ARP.
In this way, they urge the Ministry of the Interior to have the current officials of the Headquarters carry out their functions in a new “modern and intelligent building, equipped with maximum security, sufficient means in terms of occupational risk, and a sufficient staffing to guarantee the entrusted services they develop.”
In the last legislature, the Minister of the Interior, Fernando Grande-Marlaska, flatly denied that the Headquarters was going to be transferred. However, one of the points of the agreement between PSOE and ERC includes the creation of a commission to study the situation of properties owned by the State, which could open the door to the transfer.
