“No one will return me to my son, but we want to know what failed”

Xavi, 3, was one of the 16 killed in the Ramblas attackon August 17, 2017. “No one will return to my son, but we want to know what failed so that he does not happen,” his father explains to ABC, Javier Martínez. It is the general feeling of many victims of the attacks: that it is investigated, among other issues, why no one in Ripoll (Gerona), origin of the cell, detected the radicalization of the young people who integrated it. Martínez admits that his pain leads him to want to “seek the truth” after the attacks. Denounces the neglect of administrations to the set of survivors. Among others, due to the lack of psychological support, that the luckiest have been able to listen to their own pockets. In your case, it is not so, and you have to wait for you to meet after three or four months of waiting.

«To the indignation for feeling mistreated, it is added that they call me conspiracy when I ask to investigate», He laments. His way of “managing suffering”, which will drag for life, confirms, is to want to know every detail of the attacks. On the appearance on Thursday of one of the condemned terrorists, Mohamed Houli, in Congress, points out: «He has not said anything new, we already knew that the CNI had spoken with the Ripoll’s magnet. Each one who thinks what he wants, Xavi will not be returned to me.

Martínez has moved to a mountain village, in Lleida, to try to move on. The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) admitted a few days ago to “know the whole truth” about attacks. “In any country in the world, it would be normal to investigate what has happened,” he emphasizes the Investigation Commission in Congress.

Also from the extinct Victim Attention Unit (UAVAT), which coordinated the attention to the survivors of the attacks in Barcelona and Cambrils, Roberto Manrique He emphasizes that the claim to deepen the investigations “does not seek to blame the government of the attacks, but to know what was done wrong, so that it will not be repeated again.” For example, «If in a villa [el de Alcanar] Are they accumulating dozens of butane, nobody gave the alert? Either what [la célula] I would have been buying chemical substances and nobody realized anything? ”He recalls. Among others, they continue to ask for the opening of a victims’ care office in Catalonia. «More than seven years have passed and nothing has changed», The Hipercor attack survivor also laments.

On the appearance of Houli, he indicates: «If for my attack they would have had to come to Congress [Simón] Caride, [Domingo] Troitiño or sister [Santi Potros]I wouldn’t have imported me. The maximum objective is to know what has happened so that it does not happen again, ”he reiterates.

For some victims, the terrorist’s appearance has been painful. Among them, Miguel Lópezthat on August 17, 2017 he was in the Ramblas with the youngest of his daughters. It suffers serious posttraumatic stress and there are still many nights that awakening that nightmare. He confesses that on Thursday, when Houli arrived at Congress, he holds hard for a few seconds and had to stop listening. “I felt inside a uprising and anxiety.” «His words create confusion, and expectation“, He points out,” trying to leave things in the air. ” He believes that the condemned «was there with very clear ideas, with the intention of sowing doubt. Somehow it will have come that the victims want to know the truth. But what veracity are you going to give someone like that? If you have something to explain that I would have done it in front of the judge».

López also regrets that the victims “are always currency” of the politician on duty, when in all these years someone they call them to ask how they are.

Yolanda Ortizthat the 17th was in the Ramblas with his two children, he believes that Houli was the Congress to “laugh at all of us.” «When I saw him I thought: ‘Maybe he’s repentant and wants to speak’, but then he gave me a lot of anger, because he threw the stone and hid his hand. The fact of releasing the bomb and then not wanting to answer any more questions … I think When a person is repentant and wants to help others, it gives much more information. I am convinced that what he said is true, but in the face of conviction and that it can be a truth, believed, should have given more data, ”he says.

Ortiz reproaches that after more than seven years since the attacks, in which Houli has given different versions about his role in the cell, “this still disqualifies him more.” «It does not help me that a person comes to me and tell me, ‘As much as I explain you will not understand me’, because I try to explain it to me, because maybe it surprises you and I understand you. I didn’t believe it. I didn’t even believed his feeling, which said ‘I’m very sorry’. Truly a repentant person would have given more information. He was a victim and explained anything».

Another of the 17th survivors, Lourdes Porcarhe explains to this newspaper that if something that the terrorist can contribute, it can be investigated, “Does not miss anything to listen». It also reproaches the “theater” of some politicians when leaving the commission when, in all these years, they have not yet bothered to be interested in the state of the victims, beyond the photo on duty on each anniversary. “We want what happened does not repeat,” he emphasizes. That is the only objective of the survivors.