He Government decrees official mourning for the fatal victims of DANA which has devastated eastern Spain since Tuesday evening and will decree the area as “highly affected” during the next Council of Ministers, Moncloa does not however have official figures on the missing. underlines “the enormous scale of the tragedy”, explained Ángel Víctor Torres during an appearance before the media in La Moncloa.
The number of deaths at this time of the afternoon was 62, he announced, although government sources confirmed a few minutes later that It rose to just 70 in Valencia. A figure to which we must also add the two deaths in Cuencia and Albacete. Something that shows the “enormous” scale of the disaster.
The Minister of Territorial Policy is one of the members of the crisis committee set up yesterday by the Spanish executive to deal with the disaster and held a first meeting this Wednesday morning chaired by Pedro Sanchez. The President of the Government will also visit the Valencian Community this Thursday, Torres said, to see the extent of the damage in the region.
When you return to the capital, there will be a second meeting of this body established this Tuesday evening on a “permanent” basis. Also present are the first, second and third vice-presidents, the ministers of Defense, Transport, the Presidency and Justice, Science and the Interior, as well as representatives of the UME, the AEMET and civil protection.
Minister Margarita Robles also announced early in the morning, after the suspension of the plenary session of the Congress of Deputies – which was then resumed only for the government to validate the decree-law for the renewal of RTVE – that he Ministry of Defense deployed more than a thousand soldiers from the Military Emergency Unit (UME) to deal with this deadly DANA. Around 250 soldiers are currently responding to the affected areas, while the rest are waiting to act.
At the same time, the leader of the opposition, Alberto Núñez Feijóo, requested by letter to the President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyenthat Brussels activate “all community instruments as quickly as possible” to “mitigate the consequences” of the storm. Podemos did the same. MEPs Irene Montero and Isa Serra also submitted to the EU, through another letter, the request for activation of the European Solidarity Fund. Likewise, Sanchez, in an institutional statement at the start of the meeting of the government crisis committee, also assured the Spanish people that he would make available to all those affected all state resources “and if necessary ” also those of the EU.
The response from Brussels was not long in coming. Vonder Leyen has given the green light for the activation of the European Copernicus satellite system to help coordinate rescue operations in devastated areas. “Europe is ready to help”declared the head of the Community Executive during a press conference in the Belgian capital. A few words he said in Spanish, a clear nod to our country. He also recalled that the EU has a civil protection mechanism (which consists of a community platform through which other member states can send aid teams and resources to another in the event of a disaster) available to be activated if Spain requests it.
The People’s Party and Voice They were absent from the debate on the renewal of the public entity. They are not the only ones. Compromís, a member of the Sumar parliamentary group, also stood up to the government: “We are living a moment of mourning and extreme pain. “We are not going to participate in it,” defended Valencian MP Águeda Micó.
