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The renowned Hispanicist Paul Preston, Professor of International History at the London School of Economics (LSE), received an honorary PhD from Tarragona’s Rovira i Virgili University (URV) on Friday. Before the ceremony, Preston seized the opportunity to state that comparing the Spanish language's current situation in Catalonia to that of the Catalan language during Franco's dictatorship "is ridiculous". "In 35 years no one told me anything for not speaking Catalan", he said in perfect Catalan. Preston's remarks follow controversial statements by the Spanish Minister for Education José Ignacio Wert on Wednesday. In particular, the Spanish Minister was recorded stating that "the situation of Spanish [language] in the education system of Catalonia, limited to being used as a non-tuition language, like any foreign language, is comparable to the situation of Catalan [language] in the times they like so much to remember", referring to Franco's dictatorship.

The Spanish Minister for Education, José Ignacio Wert, has been recorded stating that "the situation of Spanish in the education system of Catalonia, limited to being used as a non-tuition language, like any foreign language, is comparable to the situation of Catalan in the times they like so much to remember", referring to Franco's dictatorship. Wert made the statement on Wednesday with a group of journalists and one of them recorded it. His words were immediately replied to by many Catalan parties, and Wert had to clarify a few hours later that he had expressed himself in a wrong way. He then said that Catalan was persecuted during Francoism "in a ruthless way" and that such persecution was "abominable". However, his previous statement is to be added to a long list, such as when in October 2012 he said that "Catalan pupils must be Hispanicised", defending the cultural homogenisation promoted by Spanish nationalism for the last centuries.

Spain's Supreme Court has once again ruled against the Catalan school model, following the individual appeals of a very small group of parents that wanted their children to be schooled in Spanish within Catalonia's public education system. Spain's Supreme Court (TS) has backed the decision of the Catalan Supreme Court (TSJC) to oblige schools in Catalonia to teach "at least 25%" of their subjects in Spanish, including "at least" one core subject. The TS considers such a share to be "reasonable and proportionate". It also admitted that by imposing such a share, the TSJC was "substituting" the role of the Catalan Government and Parliament. However, the TS justified such an invasion of powers because it considers the Catalan Government to have  disobeyed its previous rulings and not changed the school model to make sure that children can also have Spanish as a regular tuition language if parents request this. However, the TS’ decisions are far from reasonable, according to a broad majority of Catalan society, since it breaks social cohesion and a model approved by an extremely broad consensus that perfectly guarantees the knowledge of both Spanish and Catalan.

The Spanish Ministry of Education has filed an appeal to the Supreme Court of Catalonia (TSJC) to cancel the already-sent enrolment applications for the next school year in order to include the option of choosing Spanish as the language of tuition. Five parties representing 80% of the Catalan Parliament have strongly protested against this "new attack" on a school model that guarantees that pupils master both Spanish and Catalan and has many flexibility measures for newcomers. The model is also backed by an extremely broad majority of Catalan society and only a few dozen families, out of the 1.55 million pupils in Catalonia, had requested education in Spanish. Linguistic immersion in Catalan ensures knowledge of the language by children who are not regularly exposed to it, while the model also ensures knowledge of Spanish. Therefore, equal opportunities and complete bilingualism are ensured. However, the model has been the target of Spanish nationalists for a long time.

A state funeral for the victims of the Germanwings plane that was intentionally crashed in the French Alps in March is to be held this Monday evening at 6pm (CET) at Barcelona's Sagrada Família basilica. The flight was going from Barcelona to Düsseldorf and, out of the 150 casualties, 53 were living in Catalonia. The ceremony follows the state funeral that took place in Cologne's Cathedral 10 days ago. The King of Spain, Felipe VI, is going to be attending the Barcelona ceremony, together with his wife, Queen Letizia. There has been some controversy over the fact that the Cardinal Archbishop of Barcelona, Lluís Martínez Sistach, has chosen to celebrate a Catholic mass, instead of holding a multi-confessional ceremony in order to represent as much as possible the victims' different faiths. Regarding language diversity, the ceremony will be held in Spanish, Catalan, German, French, English and Greek. In the German ceremony, Catalan was not included, nor was it included on the memorial plaque set at the crash site.

The governments of Catalonia, the Basque Country, Andalusia, the Canary Islands and Asturias, which are the only Autonomous Communities that are not run by the governing People's Party (PP), have protested once again against yet another recentralising measure of the Spanish Executive that violates their exclusive powers on Education. The representatives of these 5 Autonomous Communities, which together represent almost 50% of Spain's population, left a meeting organised by the Spanish Minister for Education, José Ignacio Wert, held to present a new centralist and imposed measure in this field: from now on, the final exams of the obligatory education cycle and the baccalaureate (A-levels) will be drafted by the Spanish Government, which will make sure they are "homogenous" for the whole of Spain, as Wert said. Far from being anecdotal, the measure means subjects such as History of Catalonia, Catalan Geography and Catalan Language and Literature will not be included in the exams or will be treated as second-class subjects. 

As was expected, the Constitutional Court has accepted the Spanish Government's appeal against the Catalan Law on External Action and Relations with the EU, which was approved last November and was already foreseen in the 2006 Catalan Statute of Autonomy. The Court's acceptance of a Spanish Government appeal automatically represents a temporary suspension of the legal measure for an initial 5-month period. The temporary suspension does not mean that the law will ultimately be suspended, but that there are enough reasons to study whether the Catalan law fits within the Constitution or not. According to the Spanish PM Mariano Rajoy, the law goes beyond the Catalan Government's attributions and invades the Spanish Executive's exclusive powers regarding international relations and the direction of Spain's external policy.

The People's Party (PP), which runs the Spanish Government and holds an absolute majority in the regional parliament of the Valencian Community (also called Valencian Country), has approved the Law on Identity Signs with votes from party members only. The Law entered into force this Friday. The new regional rule sets what are Valencia's identity symbols and traditions, and also insists on defining Valencian as a totally different language from Catalan, going against all scientific studies and experts. It also foresees sanctions for any organisation which states that Valencian is a dialect of Catalan. During the last few decades, Valencian regionalist politicians – most of whom have a strong Spanish nationalist ideology – have been working on differentiating the Valencian dialect from Catalan spoken in the rest of the territories that have Catalan as their native language. The PP has strongly contributed to this split, politicising the unity of Catalan language and also splitting Valencian society over identity issues.

This year is the 20^th anniversary of the death of Valencian singer Ovidi Montllor who, along with other artists, promoted Catalan music during the Franco dictatorship and the transition years to democracy. Though not well-known internationally, Montllor was an important figure in the Catalan music world and especially in the opposition to the dictatorship. Back then, he started to accompany his poems with music and those of renown Catalan poets like Joan Salvat-Papasseit. For this reason, throughout the year there will be a lot of events and tributes paid to him. One of these tributes is a book to be published in March written by Catalan writer Jordi Tormo made up of photographs, poems and a review of his career.

Isona Passola, the producer of the internationally-acclaimed Catalan film ‘Pa Negre’ (Black Bread), the Spanish contender for an Oscar in 2013, believes that “Catalan culture can be appreciated worldwide”. Passola has made many historical documentaries and is now convinced that “life acquires meaning when working for collective benefit”. Last year she presented ‘L’Endemà’, a documentary aimed at countering the arguments against Catalan independence and financed through crowd-funding. Passola, the current president of the Catalan Film Academy, is “a true defender of the right to form a family” and “has never lost the joie de vivre”.

The regional Government of Aragon, run by the People's Party (PP), has removed the last legal trace of the Catalan and Aragonese languages in the region. This action has provoked a civil and political movement in defence of both languages spoken by thousands of citizens in the Aragonese Pyrenees and in “la Franja” (the Strip), a narrow piece of land in the eastern part of the region, bordering Catalonia. Since 1999, the Aragonese Cultural Heritage Act recognised Catalan and Aragonese as “minority languages from Aragon” and as a “specially protected cultural wealth”. However, the regional Parliament, led by the People’s Party (PP) and the Regionalist Aragonese Party (PAR), passed a law that ends this protection and the denomination of "Catalan" and "Aragonese".  

The Catalan Government’s Deputy Minister for External Affairs, Roger Albinyana, announced the Executive’s aim to have a network of “about 50 delegations” throughout the world, representing Catalonia’s political, business and cultural interests abroad. The Catalan Government currently has 7 delegations abroad, after the new representations in Rome and Vienna start to work on Monday, when the representatives were appointed. The 5 others are located in Brussels, London, Paris, Berlin and Washington. In the coming “months and years”, the Catalan Government will continue to open new delegations. Regardless of the hypothetical independence from Spain, the Catalan Executive already has the powers to have its own External Action policy, recognised by the Catalan Statute of Autonomy from 2006, although with many limitations.

The Catalan Parliament approved on Wednesday the Law on the Val d’Aran’s special status within Catalonia, recognising its “Occitan national reality” and its right to self-determination. This small Pyrenean valley, surrounded by high peaks and located in Catalonia’s north-western corner, is the last land where the Occitan language is widely spoken, although it is called Aranese there. The Val d’Aran County has had a certain degree of self-rule within Catalonia since 1990, further recognised with the Catalan Statute of Autonomy from 2006. In addition, since September 2010, Aranese is Catalonia’s third official language, being the preferred language in this county. The law approved this Wednesday develops and consolidates the Val d’Aran’s special regime, with its own powers of self-rule and structures. In order to enter into force, it will have to be approved through referendum by the less than 11,000 inhabitants of the valley.

The President of the Left-Wing Catalan Independence Party ERC, Oriol Junqueras, has explained his own road map to allow citizens to vote on independence from Spain and build a new state. Junqueras proposed running in immediate early elections through different pro-independence lists with shared elements and opened to independents, in order to respect diversity. The ERC leader differed from the proposal of running through a single electoral list made by the President of the Catalan Government and leader of the centre-right pro-Catalan State coalition CiU, Artur Mas. Junqueras insisted on the need to answer to the social and economic concerns of many citizens in addition to those about independence. Should they altogether obtain a majority, the different pro-independence candidatures should form a national unity government and start building the new state from day one. He particularly emphasised the need to include those who did not voted for independence in the constituent process, which should be finally ratified in a referendum.

The Emeritus Professor at the University of Amsterdam and political scientist, Meindert Fennema, spoke with the CNA about the Catalan independence process. According to this recognised expert in populism throughout Europe, the "Catalan process is not populist". Fennema emphasised that the origins of European populism and the Catalan independence movement are rooted in different historical contexts, and pointed out that the two have indisputable differences. One great contrast is that "populism started as an anti-immigrant movement", while "for historical reasons, Catalans have always embraced their immigrants". Moreover, the Catalan attitude towards government and the European Union integration is totally different than those adopted in populist stances, he highlighted. Furthermore he asserted that the claims that the Catalan independence process is a populist movement are false.