Catalonia’s Ombudsman brings catalanophobic tweets to Prosecutor’s attention following death of teacher

Once again, Catalonia’s Ombudsman has approached the Prosecutor of Catalonia’s High Court asking that the necessary steps be taken about the catalanophobic messages posted on Twitter following the tragic incident in a Barcelona secondary school last Monday, when one teacher died and four other people were wounded.

Rafael Ribó, who expressed his condolences and claimed to be deeply saddened by the incident where a minor was involved, regards the tweets as despicable and extremely cruel. What’s more, they may actually constitute a hate speech offence, as in the case of the Germanwings plane crash.

He has also asked the Spanish Ombudsman to forward to the Spanish Prosecutor his thoughts on the need to investigate the source of the messages and to establish whether any hate speech charges should be pressed.

Finally, Ribó has also approached the authorities to ask them to strengthen the existing legislation so that such crimes are more easily investigated and punished.