HUNDREDS HURT IN SPAIN POLL CLASHES
HUNDREDS of protesters were injured when Spanish riot police fired rubber bullets at voters in Barcelona yesterday as an unofficial independence referendum erupted into bloody violence.
With polling stations throwing open their doors for Catalonia’s controversial poll – which had been declared illegal by Madrid – state police officers stormed buildings and seized ballot boxes.
In Sarria de Ter, near Gerona, authorities used an axe to smash down the doors of a polling station where Catalan president Carles Puigdemont was due to cast his vote.
There were similar scenes at other polling stations across the region. In Barcelona police fired rubber bullets to disperse thousands of demonstrators. Officers armed with batons and riot shields then fought with voters as scuffles descended into more serious clashes.
Police also forcibly removed hundreds from a polling station at a school in the city.
Daniel Riano, 54, who was inside the Estela school, said: “We were waiting inside to vote when the national police used force to enter. They used a mace to break in the glass door and they took everything.
“One policeman put me in a headlock to drag me out, while I was holding my wife’s hand.”
Images of elderly voters with blood pouring from head wounds flooded social media, with officers also seen dragging people out of stations by their hair and pushing others down staircases.
While official figures said 761 had been injured many more are believed to have been hurt.
The violence in the region’s capital meant Barcelona’s football match against Las Palmas had to be played behind closed doors.
The violence began after Spain’s Constitutional Court suspended the referendum.
Catalan regional government spokesman Jordi Turull warned that the crushing of the protest could prompt legal action.
He said: “The Spanish state has been very compromised and will end up responding to the international courts.”