The Diplomat
Five conservative members of the General Council of the Judiciary (CGPJ) have sent a letter to the vice president of the European Commission, Vera Jourová, in which they denounce the “countless” attacks by Podemos against judges and courts since January 2020.
The letter, sent by the councilors Carmen Llombart, José Antonio Ballestero, Gerardo Martínez Tristán, Ángeles Carmona and José María Macías, includes a 171-page dossier with more than one hundred journalistic information in which, in their opinion, demonstrates the “contempt” for judges and courts by, among others, the former vice president of the Government and founder of Podemos, Pablo Iglesias, the ministers Irene Montero and Ione Belarra and the parliamentary spokesman of Unidas Podemos in Congress Pablo Echenique, among others.
The dossier includes six institutional communications of the Permanent Commission of the General Council of the Judiciary, issued between January 2020 and November 2022 to defend against several attacks by Podemos on judges in relation to the “only yes is yes” law, the convictions of deputies Alberto Rodríguez and Isa Serra, the “Dina case”, the judicial investigation of the alleged irregular financing of Podemos, the case of the procés and the actions of the Prosecutor’s Office regarding the king emeritus. These attacks, according to the judges, include expressions such as “macho, moral filth or fachas (right-wing) with toga” or complaints in which it is assured that the judiciary is “kidnapped by the right”.
“Bearing in mind that the objective of the rule of law standard defined by the Venice Commission and recommended by the Commission is to avoid statements of contempt for the judiciary that call into question its prestige in the eyes of the public, we understand that the effect that such statements have on the public through the media is highly relevant,” warn the signatories, who hope that their letter will serve to complement the testimony offered by the CGPJ to the Commission for the preparation of the report on the rule of law in 2023.
