Pedro Sánchez announced this morning in Congress the battery of initiatives and legislative reforms with which he intends to settle the espionage scandal against the independence movement that threatens the course of the legislature. In the first place, the President of the Government has revealed that he will accelerate the approval of a new Official Secrets Law, which will replace the one in force since 1968, in the midst of the dictatorship. “It cannot be postponed that the norm adapts to democratic and constitutional principles”, he has affirmed. Secondly, he has announced that the Executive will reform the organic law regulating the judicial control of the National Intelligence Center (CNI), in line with the recent recommendations of the Ombudsman. The objective, he explained, is "to reinforce the guarantees of judicial control, in addition to ensuring the maximum respect for the individual and political rights of people."
Likewise, Sánchez has assured that the Executive will update both its national security strategy for 2021 and the cybersecurity plan. With all these measures, the Chief Executive has assured that "the necessary changes will be undertaken to prevent these security breaches from occurring again in the future".
The head of the Executive, in any case, has disassociated himself from the espionage carried out by the CNI with judicial authorization on 18 pro-independence leaders, including the current president of the Generalitat, Pere Aragonès, as well as the rest of the politicians and activists whose motives were infected by the Pegasus program, according to the Canadian Citizen Lab center. “The Government sets the priorities in terms of risks to national security in its intelligence directive. But the Government neither knows nor decides on the operational decisions of the intelligence services”, he has alleged. The final decision, he has assured him, always corresponds to the judicial authority.
"I can guarantee that no abuse has been tolerated, nor will it be in the future," Sánchez warned in any case as a conclusion to his first speech before the plenary session of Congress that is today debating the espionage scandal against independence with the Pegasus program. “It is fair to recognize that with this government there is no room for the illegal action of State services, there is no room for the undignified use, as it was in the past, of those public institutions, or to try to cover up the shame of the corruption. There are reserved spaces, subject to confidentiality, but always acting within the law", defended the head of the Executive, against the complaints of the independence movement, and with harsh criticism of "democratic, political and economic corruption" that he has attributed to the governments of the Popular Party.
Sánchez has insisted on defending his commitment to dialogue to try to overcome the political conflict in Catalonia, which is by no means resolved. “There is a lot of work ahead”, he has admitted. But he has promised that he will continue to dedicate "all my energies and political determination" to reactivating this now battered path of dialogue. "My bet is to resume the dialogue", he stressed at a negotiating table whose call is still up in the air, just as a meeting with Pere Aragonès is planned. Sánchez has recognized, yes, "the bravery and courage of those of us who are committed to dialogue, and I say this in the first person plural, against those who want to break everything and return to 2017", alluding both to the current president of the Generalitat and to ERC as well as to Carlos Puigdemont and the leaders of Junts. "We are not going to retrace that path, we are going to persevere on it," he warned.
