Catalan independence movement

The Catalan Republican Left (ERC), the party of regional Prime Minister Pere Aragons, wrote a letter on Monday to the centre-right Together for Catalonia (JxCAT) party, led by former exiled Prime Minister Carles Puigdemont.

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez and his right-wing rival will each begin negotiations Monday to try to head off a fresh vote after an inconclusive snap election resulted in a hung parliament.

Defying polls that for months had written him off as defeated, the Socialist premier managed to curb the gains of the right-wing opposition.

The Catalan regional authorities launched a campaign to support women’s right to bare their breasts

Former Catalan leader Carles Puigdemont, who fled Spain after a failed secession bid for the northeastern region in 2017, was detained on Sept. 23 in Sardinia, Italy, his lawyer said.

Puigdemont, who lives in Belgium and now holds a seat in the European Parliament, has been fighting extradition to Spain, which accused him and other Catalan independence leaders of sedition.

Catalan separatist parties boosted their parliamentary majority in a regional election on Feb. 14 that was overshadowed by the pandemic and marked by low turnout, more than three years after a failed bid to break away from Spain.

Puigdemont is on a wanted warrant in Spain for holding a referendum on Catalonia's independence two years ago.
The protests against that referendum came not only from Madrid but also from Brussels.

He was echoed by Stjepan Mesic, the last president of federal Yugoslavia and president of Croatia from 2000 to 2010, who wrote to Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez to express concern over the "draconian" sentences.

Thousands of supporters of Spain's unity took to the streets of Barcelona yesterday, chanting "For coexistence, for democracy, for Catalonia!" "Enough!", Referring to street protests following the sentencing of separatist leaders, the Spanish daily Mundo reported in its electronic edition.
 

Hong Kong protesters plan to rally on Thursday evening to show solidarity with people demonstrating in Spain's wealthiest region of Catalonia over jail sentences handed out to nine separatist leaders.

One of the most prominent figures against independence for the Spanish region of Catalonia staged a counter-protest on Oct. 20 after a week of separatist unrest and called for an end to the violence.