spanish

The Catalan MEPs Jordi Solé and Josep-Maria Terricabras invite the Commissioner for Interior and Immigration to visit the CIEs in person

The Manchester City coach asks democrats worldwide to help defend civil rights in Catalonia in front of 30,000 in a rally in Barcelona

Puigdemont offers to explain referendum plan in Congress, Madrid says 'no'

Puigdemont announced the date and question of the vote flanked by Vice President Oriol Junqueras and the rest of his government

Supporters and opponents react to the announcement that the independence referendum in Catalonia will be held on October 1

Daniel Kahl, a German Barça fan, was not allowed to enter the stadium at the Copa del Rey final for carrying the ‘Estelada’

The spokesperson for the Spanish government responds to Puigdemont’s request for clarification on “what kind of force” the state “plans to use against the referendum”

A possible supplier for the referendum says it is "nonsense" to prosecute the Government for trying to buy ballot boxes

Catalonia’s Government has written a letter to the Commission to inform them about Spain's refusal to negotiate a vote on independence

The Spanish MEP Esteban González Pons asked the Estonian government to stand firm against Catalan independence

The Human Rights Institute of Andorra (IHDA) and the Catalan rights association ‘Drets’, have filed a joint complaint before the courts in Andorra against four Spanish police officers who were part of the alleged smear campaign of the Spanish Ministry of Interior against Catalan officials, the so-called “Operation Catalonia”. The highly ranked police officers shall be investigated for crimes such as threatening, coercion and extortion of citizens of Andorra with the objective of “obtaining information” on “supposedly existing bank accounts” of Catalan pro-independence politicians in order “to destroy their public image”. Representatives of the private accusation explained to the press on Tuesday that the alleged pressures of the Spanish National Police forces on citizens of another country violate international treaties, and represent a “state crime”. The complaint has already been accepted by the Instruction Court (Batllia) number 2 of Andorra.

The Catalan Government will guard geographer and journalist Gonzalo de Reparaz Rodríguez-Báez’ legacy, which was seized in 1939 and has been stored at the Spanish Civil War Archives since then. The Catalan Minister for Territory and Sustainability, Josep Rull, thanked Reparaz’s family for trusting the Catalan Government and praised their years of “judicial struggle” to recover the documents, and therefore part of its family’s history. Rull emphasized Reparaz’s contribution “to explaining the Catalan cause to Europe” and his “commitment to freedom and democracy”. Reparaz established himself in Barcelona in 1921 and came into contact with many representatives of Catalonia’s political and cultural life.

The two main Spanish parties are frontally opposed to the celebration of an independence referendum in Catalonia and their leaders will fight together against the Catalan government plans’ to hold one. In a phone conversation on Monday, the Spanish President and leader of the People’s Party (PP), Mariano Rajoy, and the re-elected leader of the Spanish Socialist Party (PSOE), Pedro Sánchez, discussed their united front against a self-determination vote in Catalonia. “The PSOE will defend the legality and the Constitution,” confirmed the Spanish Vice President, Soraya Sáenz de Santamaría, in a press conference in Madrid, where she briefed journalists about the two leaders’ conversation. According to her, the Socialists are “against the illegal referendum being planned by the Catalan Government” and will block “any attempt” to “violate” the Spanish Constitution. Sáenz de Santamaría also insisted that a self-determination referendum is “unnegotiable” but again urged the Catalan President, Carles Puigdemont, to present his plans in the Spanish Congress.

The Catalan President, Carles Puigdemont, called all political parties in favor of an independence referendum to a meeting on Monday “to analyze Mariano Rajoy’s negative answer” to Catalonia’s request for a negotiated vote, sources from the government said. “We are not planning to decide the date and question for the referendum,” the same sources confirmed, after members of the radical left CUP urged the Government to confirm when the referendum will take place. However, the same sources admitted that they might discuss it if “one of the participants” of the meeting “puts the issue on the table”. Governing party Junts pel Sí and radical-left CUP will take part in the summit, as well as Podem Catalunya, the Catalan branch of Podemos. However, Catalunya en Comú, the party of Barcelona’s Mayor Ada Colau, has so far rejected the invitation, arguing that any debates on the referendum should be held in the cross-party National Pact for the Referendum forum, and not in a government-led meeting.

A delegation of Estonian parliamentary representatives and members of the European Parliament met with the Catalan president, Carles Puigdemont, on Thursday in Barcelona. In declarations to the CNA, the head of the Catalonia Support Group in the Estonian Parliament and member of the Estonian Free Party, Artur Talvik, described the delegates’ “surprise” at the Spanish government’s “strong position” against a referendum and the “very strong methods” used to block it, referring to the legal proceedings against the Catalan Minister of Government for purchasing ballot boxes or the sentences for the 9-N symbolic vote. In the event that only a unilateral referendum is possible, Talvik assured that, in his view, it would be “also a referendum”.