Catalan Parliament speaker at Westminster: ‘We are under threat, but we will not give up’

Catalan Parliament president, Carme Forcadell, spoke at the UK Parliament in defense of the plans of the Catalan government to hold a referendum on self-determination in Catalonia despite the actions by the Spanish government to stop it. The pro-independence leader took part in the constitutive session of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Catalonia in Westminster this Monday, where she said that “we are aware that we are under threat if we fulfill our functions, but this will not make us give up on our commitment with the Catalan citizens, or stop defending our rights and freedoms”.

Forcadell referred to the Catalan government’s determination to hold a plebiscite as a “battle for democracy”. The Catalan chamber speaker also spoke about historical memory, corruption and the so-called ‘Operation Catalonia’, which refers to the alleged campaign orchestrated jointly by the Spanish executive and Spanish police to investigate pro-independence Catalan leaders in order to discredit the whole movement.

The Welsh nationalist MP Hywel Williams was appointed as the president of this discussion body, with members from most of the parties in the House of Commons and the House of Lords, including the Conservatives (represented by the Baroness Hooper, Andrew Rosindell and Pauline Latham), Labour (with Lord Berkeley), Liberal Democrats (Baroness Garden of Frognal), the Welsh Plaid Cymru (Hywel Williams and Lord Wigley) and the Scottish National Party (Douglas Chapman, Ronnie Cowan and Christopher Stephens).