Torre Pacheco, a municipality of about 40,000 in southeastern Spain, has been extremely unsettled for several days. Last week, a 68-year-old man was attacked there, and riots have broken out several evenings since then.
The man in his 60s, identified as Domingo Tomas, told broadcaster LaSexta that he was walking through a cemetery late last week when two men ran toward him. According to Tomas, they were speaking a language he didn't understand."One of them threw me to the ground and hit me. It all happened very quickly. I think they hit me and then left."
Two foreign men were arrested on suspicion of involvement in the attack, but the main suspect remained missing for some time. He was finally arrested overnight from Monday to Tuesday in Errenteria, a municipality in the Basque Country, in the far north of Spain.
The Guardia Civil had previously identified him and he was arrested when he was about to board a train to Irún, presumably to flee to France.
The incident involving the sixty-year-old has sparked a wave of violence in Torre Pacheco. For four nights in a row, dozens of burly men dressed in black have taken to the streets. They walk around with sticks,"hunting," as they say, North African immigrants.
On Sunday evening, glass bottles and other objects were also thrown at police, Reuters journalists witnessed. Police fired rubber bullets at the rioters. Ten arrests have reportedly been made so far.
According to local authorities, the riots were sparked by"xenophobic messages" spread via social media. Additional police officers have been deployed to the municipality. Since another such"hunt" is planned for Tuesday, the number of officers deployed could even reach 120.
Interior Minister Fernando Grande-Marlaska of the Socialist Party of Spain (PSOE) on Monday condemned the riots in Torre Pacheco, which targeted young foreigners. He said the violence was a result of"far-right rhetoric that equates immigration with crime without any justification."
The minister added that the situation is"under control" and that the Public Prosecution Service is already investigating what happened on social media.
