Police crack down on Catalan vote
• Hundreds injured in violence as ballot on split from Spain goes ahead
Spanish riot police burst into polling stations across Catalonia on Sunday, confiscating ballot boxes and voting papers to try to halt a banned referendum on a split from Spain as Madrid asserted its authority over the rebel region.
Police broke down doors to force entry into voting stations as defiant Catalans shouted “Out with the occupying forces!” and sang the anthem of the wealthy northeastern region. In one incident in Barcelona, police fired rubber projectiles.
Catalan officials said 337 people had been injured in the crackdown. Officers in riot gear hit people with batons and forcibly removed would-be voters from polling stations.
The referendum, declared illegal by Spain’s central government, has thrown the country into its worst constitutional crisis in decades and deepened a centuries-old rift between Madrid and Barcelona.
Despite the police action, hundreds-strong queues of people formed in cities and villages throughout the region to cast their votes. At one Barcelona polling station, elderly people and those with children entered first.
“I’m so pleased because despite all the hurdles they’ve put up, I’ve managed to vote,” said Teresa, a 72-year-old pensioner in Barcelona who had stood in line for six hours.
The ballot will have no legal status as it has been blocked by Spain’s constitutional court and Madrid for being at odds with the 1978 constitution.
A minority of about 40% of Catalans support independence, polls show, although a majority want a referendum on the issue. The region of 7.5-million people has an economy larger than that of Portugal.
However much voting takes place, a “yes” result is expected, given that most of those who support independence were expected to cast ballots while most against it were not. Organisers asked voters to turn out before dawn, hoping that large crowds would be the world’s first image of voting day.
LONG WAIT
“This is a great opportunity. I’ve waited 80 years for this,” said 92-year-old Ramon Jordana, a former taxi driver in Sant Pere de Torello, a town in the foothills of the Pyrenees and a pro-independence bastion.
The Catalan government said voters could print out ballot papers at home and lodge them at any polling station not closed down by police.
Elsewhere, people were not able to access the ballot boxes.
In a town in Girona province where Catalan leader Carles Puigdemont was due to vote, Civil Guard police smashed glass panels to open the door and search for ballot boxes.
Puigdemont voted in a different town in the province. He accused Spain of unjustified violence and said it created a dreadful image of Spain.
“The unjustified, disproportionate and irresponsible violence of the Spanish state today has not only failed to stop Catalans’ desire to vote … but helped to clarify all the doubts we had to resolve today,” he said.
The government said 11 police officers were injured.
Nicola Sturgeon, the proindependence leader of Scotland, which voted to remain part of the UK in a 2014 referendum, said she was concerned by the images she was seeing.
“Regardless of views on independence, we should all condemn the scenes being witnessed and call on Spain to change course before someone is seriously hurt,” she tweeted.
Belgian Prime Minister Charles Michel tweeted: “Violence can never be the answer! We condemn all forms of violence and reaffirm our call for political dialogue.”
About 70 polling stations had been raided by police, Spanish Interior Minister Juan Ignacio Zoido said.
The aim of the raids was to seize referendum material and not to target people wanting to vote, another senior government official said.