The Minister of the Interior, Fernando Grande-Marlaska, has defended that the police operation deployed in Navarra last week, which concluded with 28 arrests for the incidents registered on October 30, 2025, in the vicinity of the University of Navarra during protests against an event by Vito Quiles —an event that had already been suspended previously—, was "adequate and proportional to the circumstances".
"If anyone doubts that exemplary action, adequate to the circumstances of the case, they always have, in a State of Law, the procedural channels to be able to exercise their rights in any sense and proceed to the evaluation of conduct," he stressed.
In his speech in the Senate this Tuesday, in response to a question from EH Bildu senator Josu Estarrona, Grande-Marlaska recalled that on October 30, "serious violent events occurred, regardless of their origin or cause," which "generated serious violence, where containers were burned, four officers were injured - four national police officers -, where a young man who had nothing to do with the events, and also a journalist, were also seriously injured."
"In other words, a situation of violence that is obviously not covered by the exercise of any legitimate right, such as opposing, if one wishes, an event that can always take place in a democratic State within peaceful, reasonable, and logical parameters," he pointed out.
Regarding the time lapse between the disturbances and the arrests, the head of the Interior Ministry indicated that "in the context of events involving a very relevant and very important group of people, first they must be identified, identified with certainty." "And that requires serious work over time and under the direction of the judicial authority," he pointed out, emphasizing that the investigation "has been overseen by a judicial authority."
"When it was understood that the necessary and precise data had been obtained on those who had participated in public disorder, in an attack on law enforcement officers, the indicated arrests were made of those who were understood to have participated," he stated.
As he has detailed, some of the arrested individuals "were released at the police station itself," while the rest, a total of 12, were brought before the court and released provisionally with charges, indicted for crimes of public disorder and assault on law enforcement officers, among others.
"Let the process unfold through the appropriate and precise procedures in accordance with procedural and substantive legislation," he has claimed.
Before responding to Estarrona, Grande-Marlaska dedicated a few words of remembrance to the five regional police officers who died in a traffic accident in Guipúzcoa the previous week, conveying his "affection" and "solidarity" to the families of the five officers of the Regional Police, "who carry out exemplary work alongside the rest of the State Security Forces and Corps."
For his part, Josu Estarrona has described the operation with 28 detainees as "clearly disproportionate and unjustified." "Because, among other issues, there was no risk of flight whatsoever to carry out an operation of that magnitude," he has emphasized. In his opinion, "we have witnessed a new police operation that adds to the one carried out on April 28, following other disturbances that occurred in February of this year in the vicinity of El Sadar stadium." The senator has questioned whether "an exemplary punishment is intended, which seeks, in some way, to deter protest and generate fear among organized Basque youth."
In the same vein, he has pointed out that "this way of acting by the State Security Forces and Corps is not new." "But as of today, in the current political scenario, these have no place whatsoever, if they ever did," he said, considering that "we are facing an attempt to return to regime times, to times of confrontation, to erode coexistence in Navarrese society."