Bankrupt businessman arrested after attempting to blow up PP Headquarters

A bankrupt businessman has been arrested after crashing a car, loaded with two cylinders of butane gas, into the national headquarters of the Popular Party in calle Genova, Madrid on Friday.  The man was arrested at 7.00 a.m. today.

The man was also carrying two bags, currently being analyzed by police specialists.  He told police that he had "lost everything" and that in the car there were "15 kilograms of ammonal and a timer scheduled to explode within 45 minutes."  (Ammonal is an explosive made up of ammonium nitrate and aluminum powder).

However, after an initial analysis was performed on the substance found hidden in the car, it was revealed that it is combustible, but not explosive, according to police.

Police sources say that the unnamed man could be suffering from mental problems. "Everything seems to indicate this is a personal action and has nothing to do with a terrorist action," said National Police spokesman Antonio Nevado in statements to RNE. 

Various security protocols are still in place.  According to an El Mundo reader who lives close to the scene of the incident, calle Genova is "empty" and is blocked off by police at each end, at the Plaza de Colón and Alonso Martínez  but there is something that apparently looks like a robot near the crashed vehicle. "I heard a noise in the early hours of the morning and then a tumult of people," he told the newspaper.

The police have activated the so-called 'Circular 50' protocol for attacks using explosive devices. Agents have cordoned off the building perimeter for security, and public and private traffic has been halted in the area.

As a precaution the subway service on line 4, between the San Bernardo and Goya stations, has been halted. In addition, there will be no stops in Alonso Martínez station, lines 5 and 10. 

Police have urged workers for the PP headquarters to stay away from the building until they have completed their analysis on the crashed vehicle.

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Photo: Twitter post: Estrellan un vehículo contra la sede del PP en Madrid que podría tener explosivos http://t.co/XeI5SbvxPc pic.twitter.com/G0K09URR3R
— Santiago Romero Ruiz (@atlante83) December 19, 2014

Translation of Tweet:

They crashed a vehicle against the headquarters of the PP in Madrid that could contain explosives

Sources:

El Mundo
RT

Animal circuses to be banned in Málaga, animal rights to be protected

An announcement was made on Sunday by the mayor of Málaga that animal circuses are to be banned in the southern Spanish city.  A further ban will be made on the pony ride carousels, popular at local fairs.

 

Photo of elephant in "training" - CC by-SA Heather Norwood PETA

Local government unveiled a new federation for the protection of animal rights in the city, which is the first of its kind in Andalusia, and third nationally.  The Federation of Protectors of the Province is to be dubbed "Tidus," after a dog who died after suffering severe injuries in a fire in Valencia.  Videos telling Tidus' story can be seen on YouTube here.
 
The circus ban in Málaga itself follows the lead of several other Spanish cities, Alicante, Barcelona, Girona, Lleida, Tarragona, Vigo and Vitoria, who also decided to ban circuses that use animals in their acts.

Further work will be done on the proposal in the weeks ahead in order to reach the widest consensus possible. Meetings will shortly be held with the newly-formed Federation of Protectors of the Province and the prohibition is to be brought before the whole city council in January 2015.

Several animal rights groups have been demanding a ban on both animals in circuses and the pony rides saying that the training used is "aggressive" and produces "unnecessary animal suffering,"

The secretary of Tidus, and president of the Málaga Society for the Protection of Animals, Carmen Manzano, spoke to the media about other animal suffering, including that of dogs, saying "animal lovers and animal rights campaigners have had enough of knowing that there are breeding centres and kennels throughout Málaga where dogs are tied up day and night, often without shelter, mistreated and abandoned."

She explained that Tidus was set up show that the group "will not be silent until animals have the respect and love that, as living beings, they deserve."

 

Pony rides at the local fair in Málaga are to also be banned.

Photo: Copyright © Anne Sewell

Sources:

Gnomes
The Local

Less taxing: Madrid theater sells porn instead of tickets (Video)

An all-women theater group in Madrid, Spain was having problems selling tickets due to the high VAT charged on culture in the country.  They came up with a novel idea, in a much lower tax bracket.

It seems one of the areas most badly hit by the crisis and budget cuts in Spain is that of culture, and in this case, theater.  The ladies who run this theater company were finding it hard to sell tickets to their performances.  The VAT on theater tickets is that of a luxury item at a high 21 percent.  However, the VAT on porn magazines is a mere four percent, which makes one think it was men to set the standards.

Anyway, what they did was to print up a whole bunch of porn mags which are sold at the nearby magazine outlets.  People then show the magazine when attending the theater.  Now everyone is happy, and some are no doubt a little more excited than others...

World's largest tortilla a dud, says Guinness

It seems attempts in the city of Vitoria, up in northern Spain, to enter the iconic Guinness Book of Records by cooking the world's largest tortilla have failed.

Not only did opposition groups in the city say the attempt was "ridiculous," it seems the people at Guinness Book of Records rejected the whole thing, as the tortilla was apparently not cooked correctly.

What the Guinness people said was that they didn't accept the way the tortilla (or potato omelette) was cooked in "precooked portions and assembled like a puzzle."  That is just not on and doesn't comply with the rules.

Apparently what the chefs did was to fry the potato, onion and egg mix in normal-sized tortilla pans, producing rectangular slabs of cooked omelette, which they then fitted together like a jigsaw puzzle to create one gigantic omelette.

Antxon Belakortu, representing the Basque nationalist party Bildu in the town called the whole thing "a circus," while Patxi Lazcoz, from the Basque wing of Spain’s Socialist party, said the whole endeavor was a "scam" adding that Vitoria will now be christened "the capital of the ridiculous" in the worldwide media.

Spanish news agency 20 Minutos referred to the whole thing as "tortillagate."

However, it seems the Popular Party mayor of Vitoria, Javier Maroto, said just having attempted the record was something "positive" for the city and that it was "worth the effort". The record-breaking attempt happened on August 2nd and was supervised by Spanish chef Senén González, who received a 2010 Spanish award for the best tortilla.  The omelette itself comprised a massive 1,600 kg of potatoes, 840 kgs of eggs, and 150 litres of olive oil.

The good side is that the tortilla fed a hungry crowd in the Plaza de Virgen a massive10,000 portions once it was complete.  The bad side was that González had tweeted about how happy he was after the event and will probably be really disappointed now Guinness has failed to confirm the record attempt.

The video below shows the creation of the monster tortilla (Spanish language).  You can see Guinness' point, however, as the whole thing would have needed to be cooked in that giant tortilla pan to be a true record.


Spanish language sources:

El Correo
20 Minutos
The Local (English)

Photo: 
1. Screengrab from the above video on YouTube.
2. Image of tortilla portions CC by-SA Tamorlan

End of an Era: Marín iconic flamenco doll factory closes down, cannot fight competition

 

The Marín doll factory has been producing beautiful and detailed flamenco dolls for the last 86 years.  Finally the factory, located in Chiclana, Andalusia, has had to give up the fight, claiming it is a victim of competition from Asia, and particularly China.

The dolls produced at Marín are beautifully detailed, unique and well-known internationally, but after the last ten years of struggling to keep the business going, they now have to give up.  At its peak in the 1960s and 1970s, the factory employed more than 100 workers and were producing approximately 350,000 dolls per year.  Back in 2009, the workforce at the Marín factory had to be cut from what was then 17 to only five workers.  Now, the end has finally come.

The famous dolls produced by the company have featured in various films by top Spanish film director Pedro Almodóvar, at an MTV awards ceremony in Barcelona and even on English television shows.  On the international level, the dolls have also been honored, along with doll maker José Marín Verdugo, by winning top prize at the International Dolls Biennale in Krakow.  Photos of some of the various designs are included here.

While it will be difficult to buy these iconic and beautiful dolls in future, except possibly at outrageous prices on eBay, a museum will continue to display examples of the work in Chiclana.  An introduction to the museum can be viewed below in the Spanish language.

It is regretted that in future the only flamenco dolls on sale in most shops in Spain will be the cheap and shoddily-made imitations, mass-produced in China.



Spanish sources:

La Voz Digital
El Pais
The Local

Photos:

Marín muñecas flamencas

Lanzarote Art in Nature: A Visit to the César Manrique Foundation [Video]

The César Manrique Foundation has set up a fascinating museum and art gallery on the island of Lanzarote which
offers the possibility to visit an artistic home, quite literally
embedded in nature.

This beautifully designed building was the artist’s home and studio and is located in Taro de Tahiche on this Spanish island.... read more

Shakira asks press to not photograph her son

In an interview on Sunday, Shakira told the Spanish news daily ABC that she wants the press to please leave her son alone.

Popular singer Shakira is married to the Spanish footballer, Gerard Piqué and they have a son, Milan, who is almost two years old, plus another baby on the way.

When Milan was born on January 22nd, 2013, Shakira shared an image of the baby, sleeping in his father’s arms, on the Unicef website, together with a request that people donate to the UN children’s agency.
 
She has shared some other photos of Milan with her many fans on the social media sites. However, now Milan is growing, she says she would prefer he had more privacy.

When the family recently attended the opening of a children’s store in Barcelona recently, Shakira refused to have photos taken of her son. She told ABC that she liked being able to share with fans and the people who have always supported them in the experience of being parents. She also enjoyed sharing photos of the first few months of her son’s life, but added that now Milan is growing and has stopped being a baby, she would prefer if the press didn’t focus so much on him, saying she wants him to have a normal childhood.

Shakira went on to explain that Milan doesn’t know that his father and mother are famous, saying that he recognizes them on TV and in ads and points, saying, "Mama! Papa!" but does not realize that other children do not see their parents on a “toy box.”

The Grammy Award-winning singer is apparently in the last stages of her second pregnancy and expects to release a new album after the baby’s birth. At present, Shakira is taking things easy, resting in preparation for the arrival of their new baby and says she is doing her best to keep fit and healthy. 

Milan’s parents, Shakira, 37, and Piqué, 27, originally met at the 2010 World Cup in South Africa when Piqué made an appearance in the World Cup theme song “Waka-Waka," included below. They went public with their relationship in early 2011.



Sources: 
ABC (Spanish)
The Local
International Business Times