Vice President Aragonès: 'We won't give up talks on self-determination for a new financial deal'

The new Catalan government "won't give up" plans for an independent country, according to Vice President and Minister of the Economy, Pere Aragonès. In an interview on Catalan television, Aragonès added that the new government should have a "bilateral relationship" with the Spanish executive, now led by Socialist Pedro Sánchez.

According to the Catalan vice president, Sánchez’s term in Madrid "cannot be worse" than Mariano Rajoy's. Catalan ministers started work on Monday, thus retaking control of the administration after seven months under Madrid's supervision.

"We won't give up on our right to self-determination. And we are not asking the Spanish government to give up its own principles either," Aragonès said. The new vice president added that negotiations with Madrid for concessions on financial issues should not imply renouncing a referendum or a debate about Catalonia's sovereignty. "Catalonia should be able to decide its own future," he insisted.

The new Minister of the Presidency and government spokeswoman, Elsa Artadi, also said in an interview today that the new cabinet won't give up on independence even though it will prioritize negotiations with Madrid. "We should achieve independence using other means, strengthening our society and institutions," she explained.

Damià Calvet, new Minister for Territory and Sustainability, arrived at his office early in the morning and said his priority will be to "reverse the effects" of Madrid’s direct rule of Catalonia. "We have a lot of issues on the table: infrastructure, urbanism, housing. One of the first things that we want to do is defend our Law Against Climate Change, one of the first in the south of Europe," he said. The law was suspended by the Spanish Constitutional Court over concerns that it went beyond the reserved powers of the Catalan administration. "The Spanish government challenged the law when we couldn't defend ourselves, under Article 155, and we want to restore it," the minister explained.