15.12.2016 - 21:39
The Spanish Government’s prosecution of Parliament’s President, Carme Forcadell, for allowing the debate on Catalonia’s independence in the Catalan Chamber continues to produce international reaction. Besides the motion tabled by a group of 15 MPs in the British House of Commons and the Irish republican party Sinn Féin’s rejection of the trial of Forcadell, politicians in other European countries such as Germany have also criticised Spain’s response to Catalonia’s pro-independence aspirations. The German social-democrat Bernhard von Grünberg, member of the Rhine–North Westphalia Parliament, addressed a letter to Angela Merkel’s government, together with the federal Parliaments and the European Chamber claiming that the Spanish Government “is more anti-democratic each day” and that it “refuses to dialogue” with the Catalan institutions. Civil society associations have called on citizens to hit the streets in Catalonia to support Forcadell and the Catalan President, Carles Puigdemont, has also emphasised his solidarity with the Parliament’s President. “This is not a trial against a person, it is a trail against an institution which represents the will of the Catalan people”, he said.
