Spanish coal miners”Black March’ ends in Madrid

Spanish coal miners protested their industry’s “disappearance” at the Ministry of Industry in Madrid after a month-long, almost 500-km Marcha Negra, or “Black March.” The march was initiated on foot by 80 miners from the Mieres township in the northern province of Asturias, and later by an expanded group of almost 200 with more joining from the Leon, Teruel and Palencia provinces as the procession made its way to the capital.

Miners are demonstrating against the conservative government’s proposal to cut European Union-approved coal subsidies by 63%. Seven-month-serving Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy hopes to dodge a second bailout with the deficit cuts, with the European Union agreeing on July 10 to a one-year extension that gives Spain until 2014 to meet a 3% budget deficit.

Prime Minister Rajoy’s Popular Party blew out Spain’s Socialist Party in November 2011 by winning 186 of 350 seats in the House of Parliament. Spanish media dubbed the 2011 campaign “the unemployment election” owing to Spain’s economic troubles, characterized by a 24.6% unemployment rate in May that includes more than half of Spain’s young adults.

A video at elpais.com shows a July 5 nighttime conflict between coal-mine protesters and civil guards in Pola de Lena village taking on the air of a street festival gone haywire, with crowds yelling obscenities and banding together beneath low-shooting fireworks and explosions of shattering glass, with broken bottles piling up at protesters’ feet.

Four people were wounded that night and six were arrested.

But General Workers’ union secretary Candido Mendez said in a video that support was strong for the Black March, and the “immense majority” of people showing support, sympathy and solidarity from city to city “must mean that we’re right.”

Several more were arrested and 76 wounded when the marchers met with 25,000 supporters, and riot police, at Madrid’s city centre on July 11. After reading aloud their claims in Cuzco plaza, the miners headed home by bus to thunderous applause and chants of “These are the heroes — not the [Spanish football] team!”

The miners had hoped to reach an agreement with the government before arriving in Madrid, but they weren’t received by any ministry representatives. National police guarded the ministry during the protest, concerned miners would set up a permanent camp.