Eviction of Madrid resident, 87, grips Spain as housing crisis bites

The eviction of a frail 87-year-old pensioner from her life-long home in Madrid roiled Spain on Wednesday as one of the harshest expressions of the country's chronic housing crisis.

Maricarmen had resided for 70 years in the upmarket central Retiro neighbourhood, next to the popular UNESCO-listed park of the same name, and always paid her rent, supporters say.

She had spent years in a legal battle against a real estate firm that had acquired her apartment and raised the monthly rent by 275 percent to 2,650 euros ($3,000), according to the Madrid renters' union.

The battle reached the Supreme Court which ruled in favour of the firm, clearing the way for the eviction, the union said.

Police officers charged and dragged away dozens of activists who had camped outside Maricarmen's building to try to stop the eviction on Wednesday, to cries of "shame!" from outraged protesters.

Health workers used a stretcher to escort the pensioner, who uses a wheelchair, into an ambulance as the protesters chanted "Maricarmen, you aren't alone!" behind a security cordon.

Amnesty International Spain slammed "a violation of human rights" and "a system that puts the speculative interests of a vulture fund before Maricarmen's right to stay in her house".

"It isn't an isolated case, it is just another portrayal of the suffering that thousands of households go through in Spain," Amnesty said in a statement.

In an interview with public broadcaster RTVE recorded on Tuesday, Maricarmen called the company "inhuman, and all in order to make money".

"You cannot make a person live for seven years with a machete hanging over their neck," she said, blaming the national, regional and city authorities for her plight.

Socialist Housing Minister Isabel Rodriguez insisted the minority leftist government had repeatedly tried to pass a law to ban such evictions and accused the conservative-run Madrid region of "rolling out the red carpet for these speculators".

Housing has for years been a top concern for Spaniards as supply falls short of demand, with rents and purchasing prices soaring relentlessly as elsewhere in the European Union.

Residents in the world's second-most visited country blame short-term tourist rentals such as Airbnb for driving up prices and cutting supply, sparking protests in hotspots including Barcelona.

"I'm leaving Madrid, because Madrid isn't Madrid. And the people of Madrid are no longer Madrilenos. They are all the tourists that you have in Gran Via," Maricarmen told RTVE, referring to the Spanish capital's main commercial thoroughfare.