At 2.55am, according to camp spokesperson Juan Luis Sánchez, officers began removing tents from Madrid’s Puerta del Sol while people were asleep. The overnight operation on 3 November brought the Acampada 26S occupation to an end after more than five weeks in the square. The Delegation of the Government said 334 people were removed and two were detained on suspicion of disobedience and resisting authority.
The operation involved 220 National Police officers and 180 Madrid Municipal Police officers, with firefighters and social services also taking part. Municipal cleaning crews removed tents and tarpaulins. Authorities said tents and other belongings were taken to depots, where people could collect them by claiming them. The Government Delegation said the clearance ended without violent disturbances.
Accounts of how the clearance unfolded differ. The Delegation described it as peaceful and said officers acted proportionately, paying particular attention to vulnerable people. Sánchez, speaking on La Hora de La 1, said there had been no warning and that officers used pepper spray on him, leaving what he described as considerable skin abrasions. He also said police forcibly took his mobile phone. Some people at the camp complained they were prevented from collecting their belongings.
The Delegation described the clearance as a last resort after a gradual process of official intervention. It said the camp’s circumstances had changed after several participating organisations withdrew, and that many people staying overnight were homeless or belonged to vulnerable groups. The Delegation also said the gathering had lost its original purpose. Police had reported alleged offences and incidents in or around the camp, raising public-safety concerns for people there and others nearby, including officers.
The camp began on 26 September after mobilisation over housing rights following the eviction of Maricarmen Abascal. She was 87 and had lived in the home for more than 70 years. Her eviction became a rallying point for campaigners calling for tenant protections and affordable housing. After being admitted to Hospital Gregorio Marañón because of her fragile health, she died two weeks later.
The clearance followed several communications. On 26 October, when Francisco Martín was still the Government’s delegate in Madrid, the Delegation told campers that the right of assembly was not unlimited and that a reasonable period had passed for their demands to reach the public. On 29 October, after receiving no reply, the newly appointed delegate Pilar Trinidad sent a further notice demanding that the camp be dismantled as soon as possible.
On 30 October, camp interlocutors said they were dissolving the committees that had organised the protest and that its initial demand had ended. Most commissions had already begun leaving the square and moving their organising work to neighbourhoods ahead of a planned general strike on 11 November, though some campers said they intended to stay. The Delegation said it ordered the clearance after its gradual approach failed to secure the remaining campers’ departure. The Madrid operation is separate from the arrests discussed in an earlier Barcelona report; no connection between the events is indicated.
