Torra and Sánchez search for alternative date to kick off negotiation table

Quim Torra has discounted Pedro Sánchez’s proposal of kicking off the bilateral negotiation table on Monday for “reasons of a personal and private nature,” and has instead suggested five alternative dates to begin the talks. 

The Spanish leader put next Monday, February 24, forward as the first day for talks, but on Thursday morning the Catalan executive rejected this. Torra lamented that Madrid put a "unilateral" date on the beginning of the talks and insisted that the dates must be agreed upon together. 

Instead, Torra has proposed beginning the discussions to resolve the current political deadlock as soon as tomorrow, Friday, February 21. In all, the Catalan figurehead suggested the dates February 21, 23, 26, 27 and 28, as options to begin dialogue. 

In a letter he sent to Sánchez on Thursday morning, the Catalan president regrets that the dialogue "did not start off well" and reproached his Spanish counterpart that proposing dates through the press "was not the way to show that he wants honest and fruitful dialogue." 

"You and I met at the Catalan government headquarters, that the date, as well as the place of the negotiation table and the agenda would be fixed through technical teams designated by both of us," recalled the Catalan president.

Regarding the content of the meeting, Torra says he wants to discuss the exercising of the right to self-determination and the end of repression, an amnesty for the jailed pro-indeoendence leaders, and the letter also includes the proposal of "international mediation."

Despite this dispute over the date of the meeting, Torra assures that he is ready to kick off the dialogue "as soon as possible."

The negotiation table between the two cabinets was secured by pro-independence ERC, who are partners of Quim Torra’s Junts per Catalunya party in the Catalan government. 

Esquerra abstained in the voting to name Pedro Sánchez as the Spanish president, which facilitated the Socialist leader to become Spain’s figurehead.