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The 2,885 housing units sold in Catalonia during December increased by 4% compared to the figures from a year ago. The main reason for this rise is that, in January, the Spanish Government’s tax benefits applied when purchasing a house – approved to reactivate this economic sector after the collapse of the real estate market – will no longer exist. 66% of the houses and apartments sold were second hand, while the other third were newly built. For the whole of Spain, housing sales increased by 2.3% in December. In 2012, house sales dropped by 11.3% over 2012.

Restoration works of this UNESCO World Heritage site are expected to end in May, at a cost of €225,000 and after 14 weeks. The Paleochristian cemetery of Tarragona is mostly a third century funerary site, although it also contains ruins dating between the first (Roman times) and seventh century (Visigoth period). It is located in the city’s suburbs, near the Francolí River. It is the most important cemetery of the Western Mediterranean and due to its importance and uniqueness, the City Hall has decided to make it accessible to the public again. The space has remained closed since 1992.

The music festival will celebrate its 13th anniversary with an impressive lineup and the participation of a long-list of prestigious artists. The Primavera Sound Music Festival, which takes place every year in late May in the city of Barcelona, is considered to be one of the best international music events in Southern Europe. It is also one of Barcelona’s musical highlights, along with the Sonar festival in June. This year’s Primavera Sound edition presented what is said to be the best list of participating artists since the beginning of the festival. Indie, rock and electronic music will be the mainstays of the festival.

The Catalan Banc Sabadell finished 2012 with positive results and net benefits of €81.9 million. Banc Sabadell has now reached 5th position among the Spanish financial entities in the last economic exercise due to its assets valued at €175 billion. However, this figure shows a 64.7% drop in benefits in comparison to 2011. The main reason for the decrease is the €2.54 billion for provisions, 142.2% more than 2011. The President of Banc Sabadell, Josep Oliu, emphasised the company’s solvency and spoke of its capacity to buy additional entities in the international market.

Barça Regal won the 23rd Cup in Club history this Sunday evening thanks to a superb performance in the final against Valencia Basket.This is the third Cup won by the Blaugrana of the Xavi Pascual era. Pete Mickeal was named the MVP of the final.

A great performance from Barça to beat Getafe with goals by Alexis, Messi, Villa, Tello, Iniesta and Piqué. In the absence of midfield maestro Xavi, Andrés Iniesta and Leo Messi directed a free-flowing Barça attack while assistant coach Jordi Roura was able to rest some of his overstretched players. The game was the first morning kick-off seen in the Camp Nou for several decades.

Tarragona’s intermodal freight station is located within the Bayer factory and it will serve all the companies located in the southern half of the chemical centre. Tarragona is host to Spain’s largest chemical hub, which will be connected by international-standard width railway to Central and Northern Europe once the Spanish Government has built the stretch between this economic centre and Greater Barcelona. This stretch is part of the strategic Mediterranean Railway Corridor, which the Spanish Government has been delaying for years. This main infrastructure will combine a high-speed passenger railway with goods transportation. Once completed, it will connect Gibraltar with Northern Europe via Spain’s Mediterranean ports and industrial centres, including València, Tarragona and Barcelona.

Following a report by its own legal services, the Spanish Government is considering appealing against the ‘Declaration of sovereignty and the right to self-determination by the people of Catalonia’, approved by the Catalan Parliament two weeks ago. This declaration states that, following the historical rights and the free self-determination of the people, the people of Catalonia are sovereign and therefore able decide on their own future and organise a self-determination vote to decide on Catalonia’s hypothetical independence from Spain. The Catalan President stated that, before the self-determination right of the people, “there are no rules, laws, constitutions or possible interpretations”.

Researchers from the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (UAB) have managed to completely cure dogs with type 1 diabetes through a single session of gene therapy. It is the first time ever that the effectiveness of a treatment against this illness in large animals has been proved in the world. This achievement opens the door to being able to translate a similar therapy to humans and cure type 1 diabetes, which currently has no cure and means that patients have to control their blood insulin levels for their whole lives through hormone injections, as untreated it can be fatal. Diabetes mellitus type 1 is an autoimmune illness that destroys the cells of the pancreas that produce insulin, an essential hormone in the process of transforming glucose into energy for the body’s cells.

The economic recession has meant that Catalonia’s industrial production index decreased by 2.7% last year, according to the Spanish Statistics Institute (INE). In addition, the note indicated that the Catalan industrial sector has contracted for the last 10 consecutive months. However, Catalan industry had been less affected than the Spanish average, which plummeted by 5.9% in 2012. One severely affected sector was the production of long-life goods, in which car manufacturers are included, which decreased by 7.1% in December, accumulating 28 consecutive months in the red. Another sector with problems is the means of production, with a 7.3% decrease in December and 11 consecutive months of accumulated drops.

The four-time Ballon d'Or will be a Barça player through June 30 of 2018. Messi has signed his new contract with FC Barcelona, which adds two additional years to his previous contract, set to expire in June 2016. Messi, who joined FC Barcelona when he was 13 years old and made his first-team debut three years later, will be 31 when his contract expires.

The President of the Catalan Government, Artur Mas, organised a summit with top representatives from all the public powers involved in the fight against corruption and fraud to exchange ideas and come up with a set of measures. Political parties were not invited and some of them have protested. After the meeting, Mas explained that the attendees agreed to transform the Transparency Agreement from 2001 regarding the funding of political parties into a law in order to enforce it. Furthermore, the Catalan Government will allocate more resources to the judicial powers investigating the main corruption cases. The attendees agreed to compile the initiatives discussed in a document and meet again in two weeks’ time.

Valdés, Piqué, Puyol, Alba, Busquets, Iniesta, Cesc, Pedro, Villa, Alexis, Messi, Mascherano, Alves and Adriano will play for their respective national teams on Wednesday in friendlies. Alexis Sánchez, who was named to Chile's national team, will make the shortest trip, seeing that his national team is set to play in Madrid. On the other hand, Spain, with nine Blaugrana named to the team, will travel the farthest. The Spanish side will play in Qatar against Uruguay. Carles Puyol could play his 100th match for the Spanish national team.

The Cercle d’Economia, the main Catalan economic forum open to businesspeople and academics, has published an opinion note on the political context following the last Catalan elections. In the note, the Cercle asks the Spanish Government “to talk” about the Catalan self-determination and “to reform” the Constitution accordingly. The Cercle does not explicitly back an independent Catalonia but it supports a deep reform of Spain’s territorial organisation and the finding of a negotiated solution for both parties, which may be reached through a legal referendum. In addition, the Cercle asks for a review of Spain’s internal distribution of the deficit targets among government levels and to increase those of the Autonomous Communities.

CaixaForum Girona, the social and cultural centre of “La Caixa” savings bank in the Catalan city of Girona played host to 131,158 visitors in its second year of existence. Among the different activities that took place during last year, the exhibitions registered the biggest affluence of visitors, followed by educational activities, concerts, family activities, conferences and social projects. The exhibitions dedicated to Monet, Gauguin, Rusiñol and Sunyer, the maternity photographs of Bru Rovira and the Louvre’s Egyptian collection were the most popular activities.