Laurence Dollimore
THE news of the brutal murder of an 11-year-old boy in Spain has been used by the far-right to stir up racial tensions.
Young Mateo was stabbed 11 times while playing football with friends at a sports centre in Mocejon, Toledo on Sunday.
A 20-year-old Spaniard has since confessed to the crime and police are now working on corroborating his version of events and locating the murder weapon.
However in the 36 hours leading up to his arrest, social media was awash with disinformation about the killer.
A number of far-right figures, including neo-Nazis, began spreading false claims, blaming the atrocity on young boat migrants without any factual basis.
The grieving family of Mateo was forced to release a statement to the media to deny the claims, pleading that ‘no one be criminalised for their race or skin colour.’
One tweet claiming to be a quote from the residents of Mocejon read: “On August 5, 50 Africans arrived in the village on a bus and were dropped off at Hotel Pattaya.
“We are fewer than 5,000 people and we lived peacefully. Now there are rapes, robberies and the killing of this 10-year-old boy.”
On the night of the killing, a group of young men from the Falangist Youth organisation unfurled a banner in Toledo reading: “Expel Islam. Defend Europe.”
Below pictures of the banner being unfurled on X are a string of provocative comments.
One reads: “I support them. The invasion is in phase two.”
Another said: “Someone has to start, because Spain can’t take it anymore.They are killing us little by little so that we don’t get too angry.
“Enough, leave “our children, young people, old people” in peace and go back to your country, we don’t want you here.”
One woman wrote: “We all need to protest over what is happening!”
The scenes are reminiscent of the recent riots in the UK, which were sparked by disinformation spread by far-right forces in the wake of a mass killing at a children’s dance class.
Social media was awash with claims that the killer was a young boat migrant who had recently arrived to the UK.
It later emerged that he was a 17-year-old born and raised in Britain to Rwandan parents.
