Police evict old Badalona high school where around 400 migrants were living

A large deployment of Catalan police officers began evicting the former B9 high school in Badalona at 8.20am ​​on Wednesday morning at the request of local courts.

Around 400 migrants had been living in the site, but many have been leaving in recent days.

The agents arrived shortly before 7am, but the eviction only started after daylight broke. They asked the occupants via loudspeaker to leave voluntarily.

Some did so, but others, concentrated on the road leading to the site, showed resistance, with some tense scenes of pushing and shoving seen.

Finally, the Mossos d'Esquadra officers entered the building at around 8.45am.

Around 30 people gathered, linking arms, on the road leading up to the old school when the police began the eviction.

Outside, in the square between Alfons XII and Marquès de Montroig streets, there are people gathered from various organizations, including some of the people who lived in B9, who are shouting slogans against the eviction and the police action. From this point, some objects were also thrown at the police cordon.

The police say the eviction is in response to the demand of the Badalona City Council. They explain that the court order authorizes the entry and execution of the government agreement to recover the property.

According to the Catalan police, the municipal social services will be present during the eviction to provide assistance to the affected people, as well as medical personnel.

The Badalona City Council, owner of the land, has been seeking to recover the property for two years. During this time, B9 had become a site of conflict, including cases of fights, thefts, drugs, a tuberculosis outbreak, and even a murder in recent months.

The judicial agreement for the eviction defined the site as a "village of misery" that posed "risk to collective safety and public health."

"We could die"

Occupants of the former high school denounced the completely "inhuman" eviction, leaving them on the streets in the middle of winter.

"Whoever planned this has a very hard heart," said the spokesman for the group, Younouss Drane.

The group had requested a moratorium to leave in a few months because now "people can get sick or even die from the low temperatures."

Drane also lamented that the eviction is orchestrated by a municipal government led by the conservative People's Party's Xavier Garcia Albiol who, Drane says, "seeks votes" by insulting the migrants and showing them as "savages."

At 6pm they will protest in front of the city hall.