The resolution of the European Court of Human Rights in the Atristain case was going to have consequences and the Government knew it: “We are facing a serious issue,” it acknowledged in writing, since it affects the “prosecution” of crimes of terrorism and against security of the State and may alter other procedures. This is stated in the report that the Ministry of Justice presented to the Association of Victims of Terrorism (AVT) on the 5th and to which ABC has had access.
In that report from the State Attorney’s Office, the Government warned that in the event that the five European judges rejected Spain’s appeal and refused to reexamine their decision, “Atristain’s sentence could lead to the review and possible annulment of future criminal investigations, when new statements are made by the accused that contradict those made previously in the presence of his court-appointed lawyer”.
In other words, the European resolution – this report warned – may affect the clarification of ongoing investigations or attacks perpetrated by ETA that have not yet been tried if there is no other weighty incriminating evidence beyond the statements made to the Police by those detained in incommunicado situation.
But only in these cases, in which there are no more elements that prove the guilt of the accused. This is what has happened, for example, with the former head of ETA Juan Carlos Iglesias Chouzas, alias ‘Gaddafi’, or Gorka Palacios, both recently acquitted.
Of the ETA members already firmly condemned, the Government highlighted in its report, on the other hand, the “impossibility” that the consolidation of the new European doctrine would have effects for them. According to the brief, although their sentence was dictated according to incommunicado detention, they cannot go to the Supreme Court to request that their sentence be reviewed.
Neither, assures the State Attorney, could those convicted in a situation similar to that of Atristain appeal in Strasbourg if they did not do so in due course, in a timely manner. That is, up to four months after exhausting the judicial process in our country.
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