seminar

The Catalan Department for Foreign Affairs, International Relations and Transparency will promote a seminar to share the main experiences of participative democracy worldwide. The initiative will start on the 9^th of March at Barcelona’s Centre of Contemporary Culture (CCCB) and will consist of eight sessions focused on the constitutive process which took place in Scotland, Ireland, Iceland, Ecuador, Bolivia and Chile. According to the Department, the aim of these sessions is to share recent experiences which took place in different countries in Europe and Latin America where citizen participation was not only innovative but key in the elaboration of new constitutions. The seminar will include the presence of international professors and experts in this field.

“The EU expects that the Midcat will be built by 2020”, stated EU Commissioner for Energy and Climate Action, Miguel Arias Cañete. He made this statement this Monday during the ‘Natural gas and the energy security of Europe’ seminar, organised by Gas Natural Fenosa. The Midcat pipeline is set to be built through the Catalan Pyrenees, linking the Iberian Peninsula with French and Central European networks and aims to reduce Europe's dependency on Russian gas by 40%. According to Cañete the project has a budget of 470 million euros, from which 170 million will have to be paid by Spain. Catalan Minister for Business and Employment, Felip Puig “lamented” the delay in this strategic infrastructure and attributed it to “the lack of enthusiasm” of the French government.