Kataloniji u čast - mogući referendoom

The Spain Report
‏@thespainreport
2m2 minutes ago

LATEST: Catalan National Assembly (ANC) claims separatist victory in regional elections, says result "ratifies Catalan republic".

Separatists Hold On To Majority In Catalan Election
BREAKING NEWS

Dec 21 2017—NEWS—Ciudadanos wins largest number of votes and seats, but no party comes close to a majority by itself.

The three Catalan separatist parties—Junts per Catalunya (previously PDeCat, previously CiU), Republican Catalan Left (Esquerra, ERC) and the CUP—held on to their small majority, as a block, in the regional parliament at the election held on Thursday.

With 95% of the vote counted, the block's 72 seats in 2015 had fallen by just two to 70 tonight, weeks after Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy sacked the former First Minister, Carles Puigdemont, and his entire regional government after they and separatist MPs declared independence on October 27.

The biggest individual winner of the night, in terms of votes and seats, was Ciudadanos, led by Inés Arrimadas. The centrist right party gained 300,000 more votes and eleven more seats compared to its position in 2015.

Carles Puigdemont's party, Junts per Catalunya, beat Oriol Junqueras and Republican Catalan Left to lead the separatist block.

Junts per Catalunya obtained slightly more than 900,000 votes and 34 seats. Esquerra won slightly fewer than 900,000 votes but only 32 seats.

The radical-left, pro-independence CUP lost six of its ten seats and about half of its votes.

The Catalan Socialist Party (PSC, Miquel Iceta) gained 50,000 votes and one seat.

The Popular Party in Catalonia, led by Xavier García Albiol, lost seven of its eleven seats and, like the CUP, approximately half of its votes.

Catalunya en Comú Podem, the Podemos brand for these regional elections, lost three seats compared to its previous brand result in 2015, falling to eight seats.

Both blocks obtained more votes than in 2015 due to a turnout that rose six points to 82% compared to 2015.

18% of voters abstained.

KinderLad wrote:Moraće nekakav legalan referendum da ugovore

Zuper wrote:

KinderLad wrote:Moraće nekakav legalan referendum da ugovore

Lose im geografija, za razliku do Srbije. Rusima laganica do Srbije ali do Katalonije preko 7 mora i 7 gora, pa svi znamo kako je bilo u Spanskom gradjanskom ratu...

Yannis Koutsomitis
@YanniKouts
9m9 minutes ago

#Spain Supreme Court indicts six more members of #Catalonia's separatist movement ~RTVE

Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola being investigated by Spanish police over Catalonia referendum

The former Barcelona player and manager publicly announced his intention to vote 'yes' in the October referendum, which has been deemed illegal by the Spanish government


Pep Guardiola has been named in a police report investigating the Catalan independence after the Manchester City manager publicly  pledged his support for the region to break away from the Spanish state.

A report investigating the imprisoned activists Jordi Sanchez and Jordi Cuixart over the Catalonian referendum last October has mentioned Guardiola, according to reports in Spain, and the documents will now be passed onto the Supreme Court judge Pablo Llaren.

Sanchez and Cuixart are being investigated for alleged rebellion after the Spanish government deemed the referendum illegal, but Guardiola has voiced his support for both the imprisoned duo and also for Catalonia to gain independence.

The City manager previously declared his intention to vote “yes” in the referendum on 1 October, and he attended a pro-independence rally in Barcelona during the summer alongside Carles Puigdemont – the president of the Catalan government – where he expressed his support for the campaign.

According to a police report seen by Spanish newspaper El Nacional, Guardiola is one of a number of high-profile figures being investigated for trying to sway public opinion on the referendum, with the report citing that a “manifesto was read by Josep Guardiola and intended to mobilise all supporters of independence”.

After the referendum, both Sanchez and Cuixart were jailed, along with pro-independence politicians Oriol Junqueras and Joaquim Form, and Guardiola has since worn a yellow ribbon during matches in support of those imprisoned over the campaign.

President Puigdemont has since fled to Belgium and told that he will be arrested if he returns to Spain.

Guardiola has previously said: “If Uefa or Fifa or the Premier League want to sanction me for wearing a yellow ribbon then go ahead. I am wearing it for two people who are in prison for defending the right to vote.”

The Football Association only forbids offensive messages, something that Uefa also enforces, meaning that Guardiola will not face any action over the support.

http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/football/premier-league/catalonia-referendum-election-pep-guardiola-manchester-city-investigation-spanish-police-support-a8123906.html

Spanish PM defends handling of Catalan crisis after election blow
Mariano Rajoy calls for dialogue and cooperation, after deposed Catalan leader offers to meet him but not in Spain



Spain’s prime minister has defended his handling of the Catalan crisis after the snap election he called in an attempt to settle the secessionist challenge resulted in pro-independence parties holding on to their absolute majority in parliament.

Speaking the day after the three Catalan separatist parties won a total of 70 seats in the 135-seat regional parliament, Mariano Rajoy stood by his strategy of taking control of the region in response to an illegal independence referendum and subsequent declaration of independence.

Asked whether he accepted responsibility for the disastrous poll showing of his conservative People’s party, whose presence in the Catalan parliament was reduced from 11 seats to three, Rajoy replied: “The prime minister accepts responsibility for anything that happens to the People’s party, just as all members of the People’s party across Spain do.”

He shrugged off suggestions that his use of article 155 of the Spanish constitution to suspend Catalan autonomy had proved costly and counterproductive.

“I think article 155 was applied as it needed to be,” he said. “It was not applied when the Catalan government took the first of its decisions that were against the law. We were prudent. It was applied with the agreement of an enormous majority in the senate and it was applied intelligently.”

He pointed out that the centre-right Citizens party, which strongly supported his actions, won the largest share of the Catalan vote and the greatest number of seats.

“The negative thing about these results, from my point of view, is that those of us who wanted change haven’t won enough seats to bring that to a successful conclusion,” he said at a press conference in Madrid.


He said the separatist bloc had lost two seats since the last regional election and had taken a combined 47.6% of the vote, and thus could not claim to represent all Catalans.


“Yesterday’s results also make it plain that no one can speak for Catalonia who doesn’t include all of Catalonia,” Rajoy said. “What’s clear after the vote is that Catalonia is not monolithic; Catalonia is plural and we all need to nurture that plurality as a virtue and a source or riches.”

With speculation mounting that Together for Catalonia, the party of the deposed Catalan president, Carles Puigdemont, will attempt to reassemble its previous coalition with the Catalan Republican Left party (ERC) and the anti-capitalist Popular Unity Candidacy, Rajoy called for a new direction in Catalan politics.

“Elections always offer the possibility of a new democratic beginning, an opportunity to embark on a new phase,” he said. “I trust that from now, Catalonia will enter a phase based on dialogue and not confrontation, in cooperation and not imposition, in plurality and not unilateralism.”


He said the Spanish government would be prepared to collaborate with any Catalan government that observed the law and worked to restore stability, security and social harmony to the region.

“Without respect for the law, and without a responsible Catalan government that respects it, it won’t be possible to guarantee security and certainty,” he said.

Earlier on Friday, Puigdemont, who fled to Brussels at the end of October, said he was ready to meet Rajoy to find a way out of the crisis, but stipulated that the meeting could not take place in Spain, where he faces arrest on possible charges of sedition, rebellion and misuse of public funds.

“I am willing to meet Mr Rajoy in Brussels or in any other location in the EU, so long as it is not in the Spanish state, for obvious reasons,” he said. “Catalonia wants to be an independent state, but the next step is to talk with Mariano Rajoy.”

Calling the election results a “slap in the face” for Rajoy, Puigdemont said: “We must completely change the recipe because it doesn’t work any more.”

He said Rajoy’s strategy of taking control of the region to try to head off the independence movement had failed. “All I ask is that he listens to us,” he said. “We have the right to restore that which the Spanish government changed so abruptly.”

Rajoy gave short shrift to Puigdemont’s offer, pointedly saying the leader he should meet was Inés Arrimadas, of the Catalan Citizens party, which won 37 seats and 25.4% of the vote.

“The person I need to sit down with is the person who won the election and that’s Arrimadas,” he said.

He refused to speculate on whether Puigdemont’s legal situation could complicate his return to the Catalan presidency, saying it was a matter for the courts.

Madrid’s direct rule over Catalonia is due to expire when a new Catalan government is formed. Pressed on whether article 155 could be used if the next regional administration pushed on with a unilateral quest for independence, Rajoy said he would not focus on the “worst possible situation” but added that the law had to be obeyed.

Despite the political upheaval, Barcelona was calm on Friday morning, with people finishing off their Christmas shopping or sitting glued to the TV to find out how they had fared in the annual Christmas lottery, El Gordo.

The coming weeks will see a return to the politicking as coalition talks begin, Puigdemont and his allies seek a return to power and the Spanish government looks on and weighs up its options.

Can You Govern Via Skype? The Exiled Leader of Catalonia Wants to Try.
By Joshua Keating
Jan 11, 2018, 1:35 PM


There’s a long history of governments in exile, from the leaders of Nazi-occupied countries that set up shop in London during World War II to the opposition Syrian Interim Government based in Turkey. But these were groups trying to overthrow their countries’ current leaders, not run the day-to-day business of their homelands. Nobody’s ever pulled off something like what Catalan leader Carles Puigdemont is now attempting: governing a place without being physically present in it.

Puigdemont, leader of the separatist Catalan Democratic Party, fled to Belgium in October to avoid arrest on charges of rebellion following his government’s decision to unilaterally declare independence from Spain after a controversial referendum.

The Spanish government, which did not recognize the results of the vote, assumed direct control over the region and dissolved its government, calling for new elections. The Spanish government was betting that after the chaos of the past few months, voters in the politically divided region would elect anti-independence parties and end the dangerous standoff. That didn’t happen: Separatist parties again won a narrow majority in the Catalan Parliament.

On Tuesday, the victorious parties agreed to once again elect Puigdemont as regional president. The problem is if he sets foot in Spain, he will be arrested. Traditionally, the leader would appear in person in parliament present himself and his program for a vote. But Puigdemont’s backers say there’s no reason he can’t do that through a delegate or via Skype. But the issue isn’t just his swearing-in. Given that Spain is unlikely to drop the charges against Puigdemont any time soon, he’ll have to keep governing via Skype and email indefinitely.

His opponents, not surprisingly, find this ridiculous. “It’s evident that for governing Catalonia you have to be in Catalonia, you can’t do that via WhatsApp or as a hologram,” said Ines Arrimadas, leader of the anti-independence Ciutadans party.

Nowadays, political leaders can do a large percentage of their jobs without being present. In 2010, when Norwegian Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg was stranded in New York by the Icelandic volcano eruption, his government publicized the fact that the was continuing to do his job remotely on a just-introduced device called an iPad.

But governing is more than just communicating with colleagues or even giving speeches. Catalonia is a politically divided region facing its most serious political crisis in decades, a crisis that—whether or not you support independence—he’s largely responsible for creating. Those who are already skeptical of the risky course he’s put the region on are not likely to be mollified by a president on the run from the law who exists in his home region as only a spectral, digital presence.

Perhaps the government should invest in one of those telepresence robots Edward Snowden uses to get around.

https://slate.com/technology/2018/01/can-you-govern-via-skype-the-exiled-leader-of-catalonia-wants-to-try.html

This is over': Puigdemont's Catalan independence doubts caught on camera

Ousted president’s private messages caught on TV cameras reveal admission of defeat

Sam Jones in Madrid and Stephen Burgen in Barcelona
Wed 31 Jan 2018 12.35 GMT

The ousted Catalan president, Carles Puigdemont, has admitted privately that his attempt to secure regional independence is over and claims he has been sacrificed by his own side, according to messages sent to a colleague and captured by TV cameras.

On Wednesday, a Spanish TV show published messages that Puigdemont had sent to his former health minister Toni Comín while the latter was at an event in Leuven, Belgium, the previous evening.

Sent using the Signal messaging app and written in Catalan, the texts were caught by a TV camera behind Comín and aired by Telecinco’s Ana Rosa programme.

They mention “the last days of republican Catalonia” and suggest the deposed leader is preparing to abandon his attempt to return to office.

“I guess you’ve realised that this is over,” reads one. “Our people have sacrificed us. Or at least me.” It goes on to refer to the pro-independence Catalan MP Joan Tardà, who suggested at the weekend that Puigdemont could step aside to allow another candidate to become president: “You will be ministers (I hope and wish) but I’ve already been sacrificed just like Tardà said.”

Another says “The [Spanish government’s] plan has won,” before expressing the hope that the victory will lead to the release of the four Catalan leaders in prison.

The texts were sent around the same time that Puigdemont issued a defiant message on social media, calling for unity and saying he intended to return to the presidency after last December’s election, in which pro-independence parties held on to their majority in the regional parliament.

Appearing in a video hours after the speaker of the Catalan parliament postponed a debate on the presidential investiture, in which Puigdemont was the only candidate, the former leader said he was intent on resuming office.

He confirmed on Wednesday morning that he had sent the messages, but insisted he was still the best candidate to represent the Catalan people.

“I am a journalist and I have always understood that there are limits, such as privacy, which should never be violated,” he wrote on Twitter. “I am human and I, too, have moments of doubt. I am also the president and I will not fold or back away out of respect for the gratitude I feel towards – and the commitment I have – to the citizens and the nation. Onwards!”

A spokesman for Puigdemont’s Catalan European Democratic party declined to comment on the messages, saying: “We don’t send out WhatsApp [sic] messages, we send out official messages like the one Puigdemont sent last night. That’s what’s important to us.”

Comín’s lawyer told the Catalan radio station RAC1 that while he did “not deny the veracity” of the leaked messages, they had been obtained “in an illegal manner” and would result in legal action against Telecinco.

Catalonia has been under the direct control of the Spanish government since the end of October, when the prime minister, Mariano Rajoy, responded to the Catalan parliament’s unilateral declaration of independence by sacking Puigdemont and calling fresh elections. Puigdemont fled to Brussels shortly afterwards and faces arrest on possible charges of rebellion, sedition and misuses of public funds if he returns to Spain.

ostap bender wrote:tviter-spegelj. gotova je spanija.

Gargantua wrote:http://www.cbc.ca/amp/1.4499802?__twitter_impression=true

In Catalonia, the nameless dead raise old animosities toward Franco
 
Families 'don't want revenge, they just want the truth' about the Spanish Civil War
Margaret Evans - CBC News

January 23, 2018


In the Catalan hills west of Barcelona, the nameless dead are emerging from deep layers of earth that have kept them hidden from the world's gaze for some 80 years now.
...
In 2007, Spain passed the "Historical Memory Law," introduced by the Socialist government of José Luis Rodriguez Zapatero at the time.

It made public funds available to groups seeking to find and excavate graves, stopping short of having the state take on that responsibility.

Mariano Rajoy stopped that funding when he came to power in 2011, citing the economy. But it was another blow against his government in the eyes of many Catalans who say the fate of Spain's disappeared depends on the political winds of the day.

In 2014, the United Nations Committee on Enforced Disappearances published a report criticizing Spain.

"The search for victims of enforced disappearances and resolving what happened to them are obligations of the state, even when there is no formal claim." it said.

Funding found

It has had little impact. Some of Spain's regions — Navarre and the Basque country, for example — have taken it upon themselves to do some of the work, even setting up DNA databases to help identify the dead.

It was the Catalan regional government that found the funding for and gave the go-ahead to the Soleràs excavation before Catalonia's autonomy was revoked in the midst of the crisis over the region's independence referendum.
...

Rapper jailed for three years over lyrics criticising Spanish royal family

The Spanish Supreme Court ruled his work contained glorification of terrorism, slander, 'lèse-majesté’ (defamation against the crown), and threats


Mallorcan rapper Josep Miquel Arenas Beltrán, stage name Valtonyc, has been sentenced to three years and a half in prison over the content of his song lyrics.

Catalan News reports the Spanish Supreme Court ruled that his work, which he made available to listen to online for free, contained glorification of terrorism, slander, 'lèse-majesté’ (defamation against the crown), and threats. Lawyers defending Valtonyc pushed for their client's right to freedom of expression and artistic creation, arguing that hip-hop and rap often contain provocative or symbolic language.

In "Tuerka Rap", the rapper criticises the Spanish monarchy over their relations with the Saudi royal family, their foreign policy, and their spending, as he raps: "The situation worries me quite a bit, how to support two families: mine, and the royal one."

Elsewhere, the lyrics presented in the court case included, "We want death for these pigs", referring to corrupt politicians and the Bourbon monarchy, and "may they be afraid like a [Spanish] Guardia Civil police officer in Euskadi [the Basque Country]", which references the armed conflict between Spain and the Basque National Liberation Movement, which sought independence from both Spain and France, lasting from 1959 to 2011.

Arenas took to Twitter after the decision to write, “The Supreme Court sentence is already out. Three years and six months of jail for my songs. I have to enter prison. As soon as I have more information, I’ll say more."

The mayor Barcelona, Ada Colau, expressed solidarity with Arenas, adding on Twitter: “Sad and dark times when you have to fight for something so obvious as #rappingisnotacrime, singing about Bourbon thieves... is #freedomofexpression."

Rapper Pablo Hansel had previously been sentenced to two years in prison by the Spanish National Court, with members of rap collective La Insurgencia being sentenced to two years and a day over charges of glorification of terrorism connected to the Basque Conflict.

https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/music/news/rapper-jailed-lyrics-spanish-royal-family-valtonyc-josep-miquel-arenas-beltran-a8226421.html