The Government, through the Ministry of the Interior, will reinforce with 104 agents the staffs of the National Police and Civil Guard in Cantabria on the occasion of Operation Summer. In total, the nine autonomous communities that will have the largest tourist influx this summer will see their operations strengthened with 4,407 agents, according to the design established in instruction 5/2024 of the Secretary of State for Security, Rafael Pérez.
In the case of Cantabria, the National Police will reinforce its Citizen Security units with 44 agents, while the Civil Guard will allocate another 60 troops to the summer operation in the region.
Operation Summer
Operation Summer, included in the package of measures and action plans on the occasion of the next summer period approved this Tuesday by the Council of Ministers, will start on July 1 and the police deployment will extend until August 31 in the autonomous communities of Andalusia, Asturias, Canary Islands, Cantabria, Comunitat Valenciana, Galicia, Madrid, Murcia and Balears, the latter community in which the device will be extended until September 30.
In these nine autonomous communities, the National Police will reinforce the staffing of its Citizen Security units (which total 22,471 personnel) with 2,724 officers, mostly from the promotion that has just concluded the training process at the National Police School of Ávila, who will be joined by specialists from units such as Cavalry, Canine Guides or Subsoil, among others.
With regard to the Civil Guard, the 41,537 officers assigned to Citizen Security units in the nine communities will be reinforced with another 1,683 officers who, voluntarily, have postponed the enjoyment of their holidays to a period other than the summer.
The delay in the start of the course at the Baeza Academy, which will end next September, has made it impossible for the reinforcement to be nourished by the students who finish their training period, as in previous years.
This reinforcement allows to increase the number of uniformed personnel in preventive police functions and facilitate their permanent presence in those areas of high tourist concentration that lack it outside the summer season.
Safe tourist destination
According to data from the National Institute of Statistics, in the first three months of 2024 the number of international tourists who have visited Spain has increased by 17.7% compared to the same period of the previous year, exceeding 16.1 million tourists. The Ministry of the Interior is aware of the economic impact of tourism on the national economy, so it plans police operations aimed at providing tranquility and confidence to national and foreign citizens who choose Spain as a tourist destination.
The police reinforcement planned for this summer will increase surveillance and preventive control in urban and interurban communication routes, stations, ports, airports, hotels, beaches and campsites and in those events that involve a large concentration of people.
In addition, it will enhance criminal prevention efforts, speed up investigations of the Judicial Police units and speed up and facilitate procedures in the complaint offices, shorten waiting times and increase the levels of public attention.
And all this is combined with the measures corresponding to the current reinforced Level 4 of anti-terrorist alert established in application of the Plan of Prevention, Protection and Anti-Terrorist Response.
To this Operation Summer is added the reinforcement that the Civil Guard and the National Police will allocate to the surveillance of the Camino de Santiago in their respective areas of territorial deployment.
For its part, the General Directorate of Traffic will launch the Special Traffic Operations Campaign corresponding to summer 2024 to improve road safety levels during the summer months, in which accidents pick up, scheduled departure and return dates for holiday periods, weekends and holidays.
In addition, the DGT will launch special campaigns in relation to the control of alcohol and drugs, motorcycles and vans, speed, as well as distraction at the wheel. In order to carry out these activities, the Traffic Group of the Civil Guard has 5,859 personnel, supported by the corps ' s commanders distributed throughout the national territory.