SPAIN REJECTS TALKS AND PREPARES FOR DIRECT RULE OVER CATALONIA
Mariano Rajoy’s central government unbending in face of request for negotiated constitutional settlement
Spain rejected an offer of talks from the Catalan government over the region’s bid for independence as Madrid laid the ground for direct rule after an informal referendum in which 90 per cent of those who took part voted to break away.
Instead, Soraya Saenz de Santamaria, the Spanish deputy prime minister, said the Catalan authorities had failed to give a definite response to the government’s demand to clarify the independence question by a deadline yesterday.
The national government will outline its stance if no clearcut statement is delivered by Thursday.
“Mr Puigdemont still has the opportunity to start resolving this situation, he must answer ‘Yes’ or ‘No’ to the declaration,” Mrs Saenz de Santamaria said referring to Carles Puigdemont, the president of the government of Catalonia. “It was not difficult to say yes or no to whether he had declared independence.”
In a letter to Spanish prime minister Mariano Rajoy yesterday, Mr Puigdemont made a “sincere and honest” offer for dialogue between the two men over the next two months.
Mr Rajoy has held out the threat of using the Spanish constitution to take direct control of the Catalan administration and sideline Mr Puigdemont and his officials.
As the impasse persists, the Spanish leader appears increasingly prepared to trigger the powers of the centre. “The notice that I sent you is the prior step to the procedure set out in article 155 of the constitution,” Mr Rajoy wrote in a formal response.
Mr Puigdemont’s reference to two months of dialogue in his letter was the first time the Catalan leader has placed a time limit on his call for negotiations with Madrid. If the Catalan deadline expires with no movement from Mr Rajoy, the Catalan government will declare independence unilaterally, Joaquim Forn, head of the regional interior department, said in an interview with Catalunya Radio.
“This is enough for Rajoy to justify applying article 155,” said Antonio Barroso, a political-risk analyst at Teneo Intelligence, a consulting company. “When he does, we can expect a high degree of mobilisation on the streets as the independence movement tries to claim that the central government is moving ahead in a repressive way and resisting dialogue.”
“It seems inevitable that we’re headed for article 155,” said Ignacio Goma Lanzon, a lawyer and chairman of Hay Derecho, a legal advocacy foundation in Madrid.
“The range of measures they could take under 155 is quite wide: they could kick out the current government and name new leaders, control Catalonia’s police, and eventually even call for new elections.”
Hardliners within the separatist campaign have drawn up plans to picket major economic infrastructure such as the main airport and the port if Madrid moves to take control. They have also considered targeting foreign companies operating in the region in an attempt to force other EU leaders such as Germany’s Angela Merkel to step in and help break the impasse.
If the central government does take direct control of Catalonia, Mr Rajoy will eventually have to call regional elections. That raises the prospect of confrontation between competing administrations.
“More than two million Catalans gave the regional parliament a democratic mandate to declare independence,” Mr Puigdemont said in his letter. “Our proposal for dialogue is sincere, despite all that has happened, but logically it is incompatible with the actual climate of growing repression and threat.”
In the referendum, which was banned by Spain’s supreme court, participants backed independence by 9:1 but turnout was reported at 43 per cent of the provincial electorate.
The outcome has resulted in immense division in Spanish institutions. The Spanish Civil Guard has been applauded by Spanish backers but criticised by Catalans after their operations to disrupt the referendum turned violent and voters were beaten.
Meanwhile, the senior officers of a Catalan police force face prosecution for intervening on the other side.
Police chief Josep Lluis Trapero faces interrogation before Spain’s high court over whether his force, the Mossos d’Esquadra, failed to enforce the ban on the referendum.
Mr Trapero has been put under formal investigation for sedition after failing to order the rescue of civil guard police who were trapped in a Catalan government building in Barcelona by tens of thousands of pro-independence protesters.
The tactics used by the Spanish police before the October 1 vote strained ties between Mr Rajoy and European leaders.
Belgian prime minister Charles Michel, who faces separatists in the northern region of Flanders, said the EU may have to consider stepping in to mediate if talks between Madrid and Barcelona fail.
“Only if dialogue has been definitively shown to fail should we consider international mediation,” Mr Michel said.
Such a development would be anathema to Mr Rajoy, who is due to travel to Brussels after the Thursday deadline expires to meet his EU colleagues at a summit.
They could kick out the current government and name new leaders, control Catalonia’s police, and eventually even call for new elections IGNACIO GOMA LANZON Chairman, Hay Derecho foundation