Overview
- Regional police executed the court-ordered operation early Wednesday at the abandoned B9 school in Badalona, with most occupants having left beforehand and only brief tensions reported.
- Roughly 400 people were displaced, many sub-Saharan migrants from Senegal and Gambia, including some with work or residency permits who said formal housing was unaffordable.
- Spain’s National Police detained 18 people on suspicion of lacking authorization to reside in the country, according to a lawyer representing the residents.
- The judicial order required access to social services but not rehousing for all; the town hall proposed temporary accommodation for about 30 people and regional services were assisting around 60.
- Mayor Xavier García Albiol of the conservative Popular Party led the push, framing it as a public-safety action, as tenant groups demanded housing alternatives and described it as the largest such eviction in Spain.