Altercations as protesters set barricades on fire on referendum anniversary

Protests marking the third anniversary of the Catalan independence referendum descended into altercations on Thursday night as people threw objects at police officers and set dumpsters on fire in Barcelona and the northern town of Girona.

Eighteen people were detained in Barcelona and accused of public disorders by the Catalan police, the Mossos d’Esquadra, with one more arrested in Girona.

The late-evening protests were called by the Committees in Defense of the Republic, a decentralized network of pro-independence groups created in the run-up to the 2017 referendum.