The clamp of PSOE, PP and Vox to not investigate the abuses of the military service in Congress
The socialists have blocked the requests made by Junts and ERC alleging that the Ombudsman should be the one to do it
MadridThe Minister of Defense, Margarita Robles, has not seen the 3Cat documentary that exposes the abuses suffered by thousands of young people doing military service in Spain. She herself explained this Tuesday afternoon in the Senate when she tried to shrug off the pressure from Junts to clarify the vexations, torture, and rapes during mandatory military service in the Spanish army and, specifically, the 1,900 deaths that the journalistic investigation of the program Sense ficció estimates occurred for this reason. Both the first part of the documentary, broadcast at the end of 2024 under the title Et faran un home, and the second, Et faran un home: Morts silenciades,which expands it with more testimonies, published in mid-2026, have led the pro-independence and sovereignist parties to demand the creation of an investigation committee in Congress.
The PSOE's response has been to repeatedly block it. This issue has been on the lower house's agenda for more than a year. At the beginning of 2025, ERC had already launched several parliamentary initiatives following the first part of the documentary and denounced that the Spanish government responded that it "had no record of the events described in the documentary" and disassociated itself, alleging "that they occurred in the past." Given this immobility and with the expansion of the magnitude of the events with the second part, in recent months the attempts to investigate it have multiplied to the point that Junts insists every week, when there is a spokespersons' meeting, on demanding that its creation be voted on in plenary. They did so again this Monday when the Junts members again denounced that the initiative had not prospered because PSOE, PP, and Vox had once again positioned themselves against it.
"It is now seven sessions in which the PSOE refuses to move forward with this investigation commission," lamented the Junts members in a statement in which they accuse the PSOE of playing a "double game": "It boasts of fighting the far-right while every week it votes jointly with them to continue hiding the abuses perpetrated during military service." The next day, the spokesperson for Junts, Eduard Pujol, denounced it in the Senate, lamenting that Robles "is dodging the issue." "Does he intend to rectify and face up to the abuses and deaths in military service?" he exclaimed. The Minister of Defense's argument was to pass the responsibility for the investigation to the Ombudsman, although she committed to offering "maximum collaboration" both with this body, if it initiates one, and with the justice system. Robles said she does not doubt a journalistic investigation that she "has not had time" to see and at the same time remarked that, at present, the army is a "modern and prepared" institution.
Who should investigate?
When the PSOE already held back in April this year, with an abstention in the Congress's defense committee, from debating the creation of this investigative commission, it used a similar line of argument. The socialist parliamentary group argued that the way forward should be to urge the Ombudsman to initiate actions, as it has already done with victims of sexual abuse in the Church. According to the PSOE, it is "more appropriate" for the platform of affected individuals to reach an agreement with the State and the Ombudsman to investigate it with an "individualized management" of each case. The PSOE spokesperson in Congress, Patxi López, added at a press conference that there were already too many investigative commissions underway and that "many of them" do not serve the purpose for which they are created.
The platform Trencant el Silenci, which brings together victims' families, then criticized the PSOE's refusal to support the initiative promoted by ERC, Junts, PNB, EH Bildu, BNG, Sumar, Podem, and Compromís, and branded PSOE, PP, and Vox as a "coalition of silence". Next Tuesday, June 16, they will be in Congress to request the parliamentary investigative commission and have arranged a meeting with the socialists to demand that they agree to change their position.