Police union Sinapol has sounded the alert over lack of manpower in the Azores after five of its members were attacked – two with extreme violence – on the island of São Miguel.
In a press release issued today (Tuesday), Sinapol said the archipelago’s force has reached a situation of “total rupture”.
The union blames the government which it says has failed on a promise to boost police numbers.
The attacks on police came last weekend in the borough of Ponta Delgada.
An officer was set on by “three or four people” who had been causing trouble and after he had fallen to the ground unconscious, the group continued laying into him with kicks and punches.
A second agent is understood to have run to his colleague’s aid, only to be badly beaten as well.
Sinapol explains police stations in the Azores are habitually under-manned, to the point they have to be closed when reinforcements are needed in other areas, or even on other islands.
The three further agents hurt over the weekend were attacked in a separate incident during a fair on the island.
Sinapol’s Azores vice president António Santos said his members are “tired and dismotivated”, particularly as the minister for internal administration, Anabela Rodrigues, had visited the archipelago recently, pledging reinforcements “which have not come”.
