Security Minister Patricia Bullrich announced Wednesday that the government no longer plans to demand permits for three-person meetings in public areas. 

The requirement was originally included in the 331st article of the government’s controversial “omnibus bill,” a 664-article piece of legislation sent to Congress two weeks ago, aimed at deeply reforming the Argentine state.

“It is our goal to withdraw that article directly, because it is already sufficiently explained in another article,” said Bullrich in a speech at the committees of General Legislation, Constitutional Affairs, and Budget of the Deputy Chamber organized to discuss the omnibus bill.

In its security chapter, the bill proposes five-year prison sentences for organizing a “gathering or rally” without prior authorization from the Security Ministry. These meetings were controversially defined as the “intentional and temporary gathering of three or more people in a public space.” It adds that anyone who disrupts the normal functioning of public services can be jailed for up to 3 years.

Bullrich said the article was being misinterpreted because it is linked to the bill’s transit chapter and not to the general law. The minister added that the number of people blocking a road is “irrelevant.”

“I have heard, and I understand the reason why there may have been a misinterpretation of Article 331, which states that a permit should be requested for a meeting of three people,” she said. “Since confusion has arisen, we think it is better to withdraw it. We consider it withdrawn.”

Human rights organizations considered the article a violation of the right to protest. The Center for Legal and Social Studies (CELS, by its Spanish acronym) described the article as “ridiculous.”

“It had a level of authoritarianism that not even the military dictatorship had established,” CELS Justice and Security Director Manuel Tufró told the Herald. He added that Bullrich’s argument was confusing and that the articles that remained were still very worrying.

“The background of the articles on social protest is tremendously regressive, negative, and antidemocratic,” Tufró said. “Almost every way Argentines have been protesting for the last 30 years —  picket lines, marches, demonstrations, cacerolazos — is prohibited.” According to Tufró, passing the bill would in practice eliminate the right to protest, especially spontaneous protests, since they would still require a permit

The bill also creates the new legal figure of the protest “organizer,” who could be imprisoned or fined for the protest.

“They are laying the legal basis for political persecution,” said Tufró. “The idea of criminalizing someone who calls for a demonstration or proposes a protest can be arbitrarily applied to persecute any political dissidence.”