Police Investigation After Woman Brutally Beaten by ‘Anti Fascists’ for Wearing National Flag Bracelet

The full weight of the law must be brought against the ‘antifascists’ who brutally beat a woman, reportedly for wearing a bracelet bearing the national flag, Spain’s interior minister said on Tuesday.

The attack, which left the 20-year-old woman with head injuries and a broken tooth, has been celebrated by the far left on social media. Among the seven so-called anti-fascists who have so far been arrested for the vicious assault is Alejandro Espín Sogo, who stood in local elections as a candidate for the United Left party in 2015.

The young woman was beaten by a group of as many as 20 hooded youths on Sunday morning in the city of Murcia, La Gaceta reported.

Speaking to the national newspaper, the 20-year-old recalled receiving a shower of insults from the far left mob when she exited the cocktail bar she was visiting with friends to have a smoke. Once outside, a woman chanted “Pig, pig, we’re going to kill you”, and shoved her.

The female aggressor then fled the scene while the men from the group moved in to beat their victim. After being knocked to the ground by the left wing extremists, the 20-year-old said she tried to protect herself, but that the mob then “started kicking [her] in the head”.

The woman denied being a member of any political groups and said she was targeted for wearing jewellery which featured “no political symbols, it was just a bracelet of the flag of Spain”.

“They beat me for that, they want to ban us from carrying our flag”, she said on Monday.

Murcia’s police force said the attack was typical of far left gangs, telling La Gazeta: “Attacking as a group and in greater numbers [than their victims] is characteristic of how self-proclaimed antifascists behave.”

Police don’t have a definitive motive for the attack so far, but said it’s feasible that the sight of a Spanish flag caused the leftist mob to launch the brutal attack. If confirmed to have been the reason for the assault, the source noted it would constitute a hate crime.

In a press conference on Tuesday, Spain’s interior minister Juan Ignacio Zoido described the attack in Murcia as “evil”, and called for the “full weight of the law” to be brought against the perpetrators of the “horrible act”.

The attack on Sunday comes amidst a rise in violence and extremism from the radical left in recent years, and Spain’s Interior Ministry has warned for some time that left wing extremism poses a threat to the nation.