JINHA

NEWS CENTER - After a woman was sexually assaulted at the San Fermín Festival in Spain, citizens took to the streets in protest.

Every year, the city of Pamplona (Iruña in Basque) hosts the San Fermín Festival from July 6 to July 14. On the night between July 9 and 10, a woman was sexually assaulted in a bathroom at the festival while the perpetrator's friends laughed outside. Two people who noticed the situation broke down the door of the bathroom to help the woman.

Yesterday, crowds wearing the festival's traditional dress gathered to protest the assault. Many stopped playing music for 30 minutes to protest the rape and the other acts of sexual violence common at the festival.

“We have spent many years supporting these celebrations, sold with the phrase 'in San Fermin, anything goes'. As we listen carefully, in San Fermin and like any other party, not everything goes. When a woman says ‘no’, that means no, regardless of the condition she is in and what the situation is,” said the Platform of Women and Sexist Violence and the festival collective Gora Iruñea in a statement.

Feminist groups have long called for an end to sexual assault and harassment common at the festival. In 2008, Nagore Lagaffe was killed by a man for refusing to have sex with him at the festival. Women have organized citizen efforts to stop sexual violence, such as filming the crowds during the festival, but it was only last year that police sent a team specifically to deal with sexual violence.

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