spanish government

The Torre de Glòries, an emblematic modern tower widely known as the “Torre Agbar”, with its 33.000 square meters and distinguished design by Jean Novel, is Barcelona's candidate for the new location for the European Medicines Agency (EMA) headquarters. The decision was made last Friday by the representatives of the City of Barcelona, the Government of Catalonia, and the Spanish government. The Mayoress of Barcelona, Ada Colau, the Spanish Minister of Healthcare, Dolors Montserrat, and the Catalan Minister of Health, Antoni Comín had already agreed to join forces for the promotion of the Catalan capital’s candidacy in an earlier meeting two weeks ago.

Two of the members of the Swiss Parliament delegation who visited Barcelona last week understand that Catalonia will organize a unilateral referendum if the Spanish state continues in its opposition. The Swiss parliamentarians, Socialist Mathias Reynard and Christian-Democrat Yannick Buttet warn that the Spanish Government’s rejection of dialogue pushes Catalonia towards a unilateral independence referendum and that it is “reasonable” for the pro-independence parliamentary majority to fulfill its democratic mandate. “I am not saying that it is the best solution, but I understand the Catalan Government’s stance,” said Reynard. “What will be essential from a foreign point of view, is participation. We need to know how many Catalans vote, if the referendum is organized in a unilateral way,” added Buttet.

The Spanish government is politically persecuting the Catalan National Assembly (ANC) and Òmnium Cultural, warned the two organizations on Tuesday following news that they have been fined an additional €90,000. The Spanish Data Protection Agency is asking them to pay this fine for having a non-operative database in the United States while a new international protocol for data stored in this country was being drafted. The fine comes after the Spanish authorities levied a €240,000 fine against each of these two organizations, widely known in Catalonia for their work organizing huge demonstrations in favor of independence. The ANC and Òmnium say that they are being financially strangled simply because they promote the organization of an independence referendum.

The Spanish Constitutional Court officially notified the Catalan Government about the suspension of the referendum allocations in the 2017 budget on Tuesday. The Court warned the Catalan President Carles Puigdemont and all the members of his government about the criminal consequences of disobeying the suspension. “We will keep going,” responded Puigdemont in a tweet, which included a picture of the five Court notifications that he has received so far against the plans for a referendum. The Catalan Government spokeswoman, Neus Munté, confirmed that the executive will appeal the suspension on the grounds that the organization of “electoral and participatory processes” is a competence “recognized” by the Catalan Statute, the organic law that defines the powers of the Catalan government.

Spain’s budget for 2017 allocates €1.14 billion to invest in Catalonia, €30 million less than last year. However, as a percentage, the figure represents 13.4% of the total, which is higher than in 2016, which saw only 10.7% investment for Catalonia. The allocation is still below Catalonia’s contribution to Spain's GDP, which is 19%. Although most of the investment is oriented toward infrastructures, the figures are a far cry from the major investment that Spanish President, Mariano Rajoy, announced last week for Catalonia. Indeed, he said that €4.2 billion will arrive in Catalonia by 2020. Spain's Minister of Finance, Cristóbal Montoro, admitted that the budget doesn’t include the promised measures and assured that the investment “will move forward in 2018”.

The so-called Mediterranean Railway Corridor, a long-awaited piece of infrastructure which is set to transport freight and passengers non-stop from Gibraltar to Central Europe along the Mediterranean coastline, is one of the most representative examples of Spain’s lack of investment in Catalonia. Despite being essential not only for the Spanish economy but for the entire European economy as well, its construction has been repeatedly delayed. Even the European Commission has called for “cooperation between administrations” to implement the Corridor, which is regarded as a key infrastructure for Europe. Moreover, the delays in the construction of the Corridor are affecting private investment, the Catalan Government has warned. According to Catalan Minister for Planning and Sustainability, Josep Rull, the pending business investments are worth €300 million, of which €20 million corresponds to an investment from the German multinational Basf, which announced it will expand one of its plants in Tarragona.

Former Catalan President Artur Mas has been sentenced to a two-year ban from holding public office for allowing a non-binding and symbolic vote on Catalan independence in 2014. Barcelona's High Court has found him guilty of “disobedience” and is also asking him to pay a fine of €36,500. Former Vice president Joana Ortega and former Education Minister Irene Rigau have also been banned from taking public office for a period of 1 year and 9 months and 1 year and 6 months. They will have to pay fines of €30,000 and €24,000, respectively. The prosecution was asking for a 10-year ban from public office for the three politicians.

Catalan President, Carles Puigdemont, responded to the report published this Wednesday by the newspaper ‘La Vanguardia’ revealing that Puigdemont and Spanish President, Mariano Rajoy, met secretly on the 11th of January. “There are no negotiations and they are not expected either”, he stated during the plenary session. The Catalan President added that “as soon as such negotiations happen to take place” the Parliament “will have all the information required”. Rajoy has neither confirmed nor denied that such a secret meeting between the two representatives took place. The report came after the delegate of the Spanish Government in Catalonia, Enric Millo, unleashed the controversy by assuring that the Spanish and the Catalan governments have held meetings “at all levels” and that some of them “were not made public”.

Catalan President Carles Puigdemont called once again for the Spanish Government to lay their proposal for Catalonia on the table, in the case that they have one. “We do have a concrete proposal, which is clear and has been endorsed by the citizens”, he said this Monday in Toulouse, after meeting with the MEDEF Occitanie, a French businessmen’s association. “If the Spanish State has any proposal which we are not aware of, we call them to put it on the table”, he added and emphasised that Catalonia has long been willing to negotiate. The “problem”, he lamented, is that there is no one to negotiate with. Puigdemont’s statements came after the delegate of the Spanish Government in Catalonia, Enric Millo, assured that the dialogue between both governments “exists at all levels” and that the Government in Madrid “is working to find a way out” of the political situation in Catalonia.

The Spanish president, Mariano Rajoy, is not going to offer a new fiscal deal to Catalonia similar to the one already enjoyed by the Basque Country and Navarre. In an interview with Spanish radio, Rajoy said that he is against such a deal because it would “create enormous problems” in Spain. The People’s Party leader also confirmed that he will never allow a referendum on independence in Catalonia. “I cannot do it and I don’t want to do it”, he said, after the Catalan President, Carles Puigdemont, stressed in Brussels that his government wants a referendum agreed with Spain. Rajoy warned that he won’t act “against Spanish unity, national sovereignty or the equality of all Spaniards”. “For me, the 7 million Spaniards that live in Catalonia are the same as those in the rest of Spain”, he stated.

The European Union has a role to play in resolving the current stalemate in Catalonia, according to some of the MEPs that attended on Tuesday the Catalan President’s talk in the European Parliament. “This is a European issue, I have no doubt about that. Maybe some people are in denial”, said Social Democrat MEP from Portugal Ana Gomes. The Catalan request for a referendum on independence is “reasonable”, added the Sinn Féin MEP Matt Carthy, who was also in attendance at the conference. According to Renate Weber, a Liberal MEP from Romania, the issue should be solved through a democratic dialogue because, otherwise, “the international role will play a role”. The former Minister of Foreign Affairs of Slovenia and now MEP in Brussels, Ivo Vajgl, said that the idea of explaining the Catalan Government plans in the European Parliament was “excellent” because Europe needs information on the issue.

The Catalan President, Carles Puigdemont, urged the European Union to “be part of the solution” to the Catalan situation and engage in a conflict that has now become “a European problem”. In a packed room in the European Parliament on Tuesday evening, Puigdemont said that Catalonia will celebrate a referendum on independence this year even if the Spanish government refuses to acknowledge it. The Catalan president highlighted the judicial process against pro-independence politicians and the “intransigence” of the Spanish executive, which has so far refused all Catalan calls to discuss the issue of an independence referendum. “About 80% of Catalans are in favour of calling a referendum, regardless of what their vote would be”, said Puigdemont, adding that a vote has been “a constant request” by Catalonia in recent years. “The issue at stake is not independence but democracy”, he warned.

Catalonia is seeking an agreement with Spain to celebrate an independence referendum but if Madrid continues to refuse to negotiate, the vote will go ahead anyway in 2017. This is the message that the Catalan President, Carles Puigdemont, will send to the European Parliament in a conference on Tuesday evening that is expected to be attended by about 300 people, including MEPs, international journalists and diplomats. Puigdemont will be accompanied by his two most senior ministers: Vice President Oriol Junqueras and Minister of Foreign Affairs Raül Romeva, both former MEPs and both in charge of organising the referendum. The talk has caused a stir amongst Spanish unionist MEPs, who have urged their colleagues to avoid it. The leader of the Spanish People’s Party in the European Parliament, Esteban González Pons, wrote to all his Brussels colleagues saying that the referendum plans are “an unconstitutional act, which goes not only against Spain, but also against the deepest principles and values of the EU”. Puigdemont, said on Twitter that the so-called “dialogue operation” of the Spanish Government with Catalonia “has already arrived in Brussels”. In an ironic remark following González-Pons’ letter, the Catalan President regretted the Spanish People’s Party (PP) stance on the issue.

The judicial process against Catalan politicians that helped to organise the non-binding consultation on independence on the 9th of November 2014 continues. The former Catalan Government spokesman and MP for the Catalan European Democratic Party (PDECAT) will definitely face trial after Spanish Supreme Court judge Andrés Palomo del Arco decided on Friday to start an oral case against him for alleged disobedience and administrative perversion. The Spanish public prosecutor wants Homs banned from office for a period of 9 years. The judge describes in his decision the events presented by the prosecution and says that they justify the start of trial. Former Catalan President Artur Mas, former Vicepresident Joana Ortega and former minister Irene Rigau are also facing trial for the same reason, although their case is being heard in the Catalan Supreme Court. Homs is facing the Spanish Supreme Court because he is currently a member of the Spanish Congress

“Tactfully, intelligently and with an open mind”. This is how German Chancellor Angela Merkel and the German institutions would react if they have to face a political conflict such as the Catalan one, according to the Secretary General of the Public Diplomacy Council of Catalonia (Diplocat), Albert Royo. During a conference in the Bavarian city of Augsburg, in Germany, Royo said that Berlin’s attitude would be “different” to Madrid’s. Although the German Constitutional Court said recently that Bavaria does not have the right to hold an independence referendum, Royo argued the attitude would change if pro-independence forces in this bundesland were as big as they are in Catalonia. “In Bavaria the self-determination party represents 2% of Bavarians, and has no members of Parliament. The Catalan situation is completely different. 80% of Catalans want an independence referendum and there is an independence majority in Parliament”, he pointed out. “Merkel would have dealt with a situation like this one in a different way from the Spanish government”, he added.