Eight arrested for attacking soldiers in a bar in Berriozar during World Cup final
The Guardia Civil and Policía Foral detained eight residents from the Pamplona area for assaulting soldiers in a bar in Navarre on 19 July.
Eight arrested for assault on soldiers in Navarre bar during Spain-Argentina match
The Guardia Civil and Policía Foral of Navarre detained eight people on Tuesday for their alleged involvement in an attack on a group of soldiers who were watching the World Cup final between Spain and Argentina on the terrace of a bar in Berriozar, a Navarrese town of 11,350 inhabitants. The events occurred on 19 July, according to confirmation from El País based on police sources.
Security cameras at the establishment recorded the moment when a group of hooded individuals burst onto the terrace whilst supporters of the Spanish team were watching the match seated. The attackers carried bars and expandable batons and assaulted those present for several seconds before leaving the area. Several people who were in the bar were injured.
According to digital outlet Naiz, three of the eight detained are minors. The arrested individuals are residents of Berriozar and the nearby towns of Antsoain and Txantrea, all belonging to the Pamplona region. Naiz further specifies that not all those detained face the same charges: some are attributed with direct assault, while others are accused of having issued a "warning" that there were "far-right extremists" in the area, given that, according to that local outlet, the soldiers "were wearing shirts with Nazi and Spanish nationalist symbolism, specifically from the neo-Nazi organisation Núcleo Nacional". The judge has ordered judicial secrecy on the investigation.
Both police forces jointly assumed the investigation from the beginning, which resulted in the operation that concluded with the eight arrests.
The president of the Unión del Pueblo Navarro (UPN), Cristina Ibarrola, assessed the arrests during a press conference and "congratulated" the security forces for their "rapid investigation". Ibarrola expressed her expectation that "it will be resolved with every person who in this community does what they should not do paying as soon as possible". In relation to the images captured by the cameras, she added: "They make us turn back and take us to images that make your hair stand on end and which, regrettably, from our party we have experienced quite closely". "That violence seems to me to be from other decades", she concluded.
Source: El País