The Spanish diplomat Juan Prat will become the next Catalan Delegate to the European Union, representing the Catalan Government’s interests in Brussels. Prat was the Spanish Ambassador to The Netherlands and used to be the Ambassador to NATO with former PM José Maria Aznar. He also served as the European Commission’s Director General for External Relations. Besides, Barroso and Mas will meet on the 3rd of March.
The low-cost airline Ryanair is cutting 28% of its routes from Girona airport and not replacing them with routes from other Catalan airpots. Although Ryanair promised to stay in Girona a few months ago, now the Irish airline company has accused the current Catalan Government of not respecting their agreement, for which it was receiving public subsidies. The Government is surprised by the decision and has reminded Ryanair of its current obligations.
Pep Guardiola won’t be giving up on the team’s trademark style for the game against Arsenal, even though the team will be up against a side who share their attacking instincts.
International media focus on the world’s leading congress on mobile phone technology.
The Catalan Minister for Education said that not all the 40,000 students that were meant to start the laptop programme at the next academic course will be able to do so. Although the main reason is due to the economic cutbacks, the Minister said that the are also pending teaching evaluations regarding the use of laptops.
The Museum of Contemporary Art of Barcelona has created a new area to show artworks from the 1950s to the present. The updated exhibition aims to become a 'narrative' to better understand the evolution of modern art.
Pep Guardiola is taking all of the fit first team players he has to London for the first leg of the Champions League encounter with Arsenal. Thiago is also picked, but Puyol and Jeffren are out through injury.
The Catalan movie 'Pa Negre', directed by Agustí Villaronga and filmed entirely in Catalan, is a huge hit at the Goya Awards taking home 9 awards out of 14 nominations, including the awards for the best film, the best director, and 4 of the 6 acting awards. The movie pictures the dark years after the Spanish Civil War in Catalonia.
The previous Left-Wing Catalan Government had set a maximum speed limit of 80 km/h for the highways inside Barcelona’s Metropolitan Area. Less pollution and fewer accidents were the measure’ aims. However now, after some controversy, the current Centre-Right Government changed the measure and today cars are able to circulate at 120 km/h again.
From this Monday to the coming Thursday, the Catalan capital is hosting the annual world’s most important cell phone technology event, the Mobile World Congress. About 55,000 people and 1,300 companies will attend the conference, which will generate more than 200 million euros of profit for the local economy. Barcelona needs to do its utmost best this year, as the host city from 2013 onwards is still not decided.
FC Barcelona has now taken 22 Spanish Cups, equalling Real Madrid’s own record. The win in Madrid tonight also means that Regal Barça retained the title they won last year – the first time that’s been done since Aito’s Barça achieved it in 1988.
FC Barcelona picked up a valuable point at El Molinón thanks to a beautiful finish from Villa just ten minutes from the end. Barça had trailed for the whole game after Barral’s early opener.
The Catalan Minister for Agriculture Josep Maria Pelegrí visited Berlin this week to greet the 23 Catalan companies that were exhibiting at the Fruit Logistica fair in Berlin. Catalonia has a significant fruit production industry and it exports fruit all over Europe.
The well-known Catalan wine brand Torres that is available in supermarkets all over Europe exported 72% of its production in 2010. The company registered a turn-over of 205 million euros, 11.5% more than in 2009.
At an auction this week at the Sotheby Art Auction House in London, a Salvador Dalí painting was sold for no less than 16 million euros setting a world record for the Catalan artist and for any Surrealist work of art in the world.