The four detainees after the environmentalist attack in the ‘Las Majas’ room of the Prado Museum were released on Monday, as confirmed by ABC. The Court of Instruction number 29 of Madrid communicated the news about the three women and a man who last Saturday allegedly participated in the act of protest in the Madrid art gallery. Among the four, in addition to the two people who stuck to Goya’s frames, there is a journalist from ‘El Salto’ and a student who collaborates with the aforementioned medium; all are being investigated for the alleged commission of a crime against the historical-artistic heritage. After viewing the images from the museum’s security cameras and the taking of statements from several witnesses, it was found that the two detainees also participated in the organization of the act of vandalism.
“Zero risk does not exist,” the minister said today Miquel Iceta, when asked about the security of Spanish museums. After citing a dozen attacks that have occurred in museums around the world in recent weeks, the head of Culture assured that with these “misnamed activists” there will always be the possibility that these attacks will be repeated. «In the Prado nothing has failed. What has gone wrong in the Louvre? What happened at the Uffizi? Simply, that zero risk does not exist -he insisted-. This weekend, at the Prado Museum there were nine thousand visitors. The only way to guarantee zero risk would be to close the museums, and we are not willing to do that.” According to the minister, despite the fact that some try to “minimize” these attacks and reduce them to a “symbolic” issue, the liquid that the assailants throw at the paintings, even if they are protected by glass, can leak “through the part that remains between the crystal”. Likewise, “the frames are in many cases an integral part of the work, even from the time in which the canvases were painted.”
On the security of the museums, which these days are in the pillory due to the disbandment of security guards that has forced the closure of rooms in state museums, Iceta said that “it is not just a problem of number or endowment.” The material they used on Saturday in the Prado “was not metallic, and therefore impossible to detect in the entrance detection arches.” According to Iceta, Cultura has “sufficient personnel” to deal with this threat. «The public job offers that we have called between 2018 and 2022 mean that a total of 1,610 troops will be incorporated into the Ministry of Culture and Sports compared to the 465 who joined after the public job offers called during the Government of Mariano Rajoy. With us, there are more personnel and more guarantees that events like this do not occur, ”said the minister, without referring to the closures that museums such as the Archaeological Museum have been suffering for more than a year due to not having enough guards.
The parties are moving tab and preparing the presentation of various initiatives. The PP is preparing a non-law proposal, which will contemplate aspects such as the review of security protocols in museums, the report of vacant security positions in national museums and the launch of an awareness campaign. «We find it interesting that the figure of patrimonial damage and tarnishing is incorporated. That is to say, that although the work has not been damaged, the social damage that prevents seeing that work should be penalized, “said the deputy Sol Cruz-Guzman. Iceta said that he is willing to “attend to concrete proposals that serve to better protect Spanish heritage.” That yes, questioned by the comparison that he made Paul Echenique between Spain and North Korea for the arrest of the journalist who recorded the Prado attack, Iceta called the reflection “a state of hallucination that should be cured.” In this sense, the Minister of the Interior, Fernando Grande-Marlaska, guaranteed that in Spain “no one is persecuted for their profession or ideology.”
deterrent measures
From Vox, the spokesperson for the Vox Political Action Committee, the MEP Jorge Buxadé, defined “the left and the extreme left” as “the Taliban of the West, who destroy cultural heritage.” To the left and the extreme left «the protection of the heritage of the Prado Museum does not matter to them. A few weeks ago we demanded from the Government measures to protect all national museums, they did not do it and those are the consequences ». For its part, Ciudadanos intends that these acts be punished with “dissuasive” fines (the amount of the economic sanction has not yet been established), since these actions currently have no consequences within the Spanish legal system. so announced Ines Arrimadas, president of the formation, who explained that the party seeks to promote in Congress a reform of the Spanish Historical Heritage Law, of 1985, which contemplates sanctioning these behaviors. According to Arrimadas, these “counterproductive acts” have no “relationship” with works of art and no “justification” either. Cs has analyzed the Spanish legal system and has verified that “there is a kind of loophole” that leaves these actions outside of it and, therefore, have no consequences. “We want to stop these attacks in their tracks and make them think twice before wanting to attract attention.”