Hundreds of miners protest Rajoy's cuts programme in Madrid
12 Jul 2012
Fearing loss of their livelihoods, hundreds of Spain's miners took to the streets of Madrid, making their way to the capital, after trudging miles through the country side.
Their anger spilled over into violence on the streets of Madrid, as they marched down the city's main boulevards, raising slogans, waving sticks and bursting fire crackers amid clouds of thick smoke.
Some threw and bottles at the police who were trying to contain them even as rubber bullets were fired into the crowds. Scores of protestors were handcuffed and led away their faces streaming with blood and over 20 people were injured, including police officers, demonstrators and onlookers.
Not far from the scene, prime minister Mariano Rajoy was outlining and trying to defend his latest programme of cuts, the harshest austerity measures since Spain's transition to democracy.
"I know the measures are not pleasant but they are imperative," he told Spain's congress.
The plight of the miners has drawn sympathy across Spain and has come to be viewed as the outcome of the "unfair burden", the middle and working class would need to bear as politicians desperately seek to comply with terms imposed by Brussels and save Spain from a full blown sovereign bail-out.
