Pedro Sánchez announced on Tuesday that he would pardon the Catalan separatist leaders

In the name of “reconciliation”, the Spanish government this Tuesday will pardon the nine Catalan separatist leaders imprisoned for the 2017 secession attempt, The president of the executive, Pedro Sánchez, announced it this Monday in Barcelona.

“Tomorrow, Tuesday), Thinking in the constitutional spirit of concord, I will propose to the Council of Ministers to grant pardon to the nine condemned“, Who received sentences of between nine and 13 years in prison in October 2019 and will be released in a few days, said Sánchez at the Liceo Theater in Barcelona (northeast).

“The fundamental reason for graces is their usefulness for coexistence“, Argued in his speech the socialist leader, amid the cries of some present in the room, who asked for an amnesty.

Sánchez explained that “even understanding the reasons for the rejection” of the measure by the most reluctant separatists and the right-wing opposition, his government “chose to pave the way for reconciliation and reunion” with these pardons.

“With this act we materially lift nine people out of prison, but symbolically add millions and millions of people to coexistence“Sánchez insisted.

In front of the theater, hundreds of independence demonstrators protested to demand an amnesty, an extreme measure that would involve the erasure of the crimes committed by the separatist leaders, and which for the Spanish government has no place in a democratic regime.

“Pardons are a hoax. The Sánchez government should proceed with the amnesty, ”Anna, a 73-year-old retired lawyer who refused to give her last name, told AFP. “What we want is independence, we don’t want crumbs or forgiveness,” said another protester, Angel Segura, 18.

Catalonia, a region of 7.7 million inhabitants, was rocked in 2017 by the most serious political crisis that Spain has known in four decades.

Despite the ban on justice, the regional government then chaired by the independentist Carles Puigdemont organized a referendum on self-determination, marked by scenes of police violence that went around the world.

Intense campaign

A few weeks later, the Catalan Parliament unilaterally declared the region’s independence, prompting the immediate reaction of the Spanish government, then chaired by the conservative Mariano Rajoy, who dismissed the regional executive and placed this autonomous community under supervision.

Haunted by justice, independence leaders have fled Spain, like Puigdemont, or have been arrested.

In October 2019, the Supreme Court sentenced nine separatist leaders to prison sentences between 9 and 13 years, a phrase that sparked massive protests in Catalonia, some of them violent.

Rejected by the Supreme Court which condemned them, forgiveness for the separatists does not have the support of the majority either: according to an Ipsos poll, 53% of Spanish citizens oppose it, although 68% of Catalans see the pardon measures well.

The right and the far right concentrated tens of thousands of people in Madrid on June 13 against these pardons Motivated only, according to them, by Sánchez’s desire to remain in power, since his minority government must retain the support of the separatists in Congress.

The government’s relentless campaign paid off, however, and last week it received forgiveness support from employers, traditionally reluctant to independence, as well as from Catalan bishops.

Unlocking

The graces will arrive by taking advantage of the end of the pandemic and that the next national elections, scheduled for January 2024 at the latest, are quite far away.

“Over time, if the economy is going well, and when citizens perceive that this solution to the crisis will not be like in 2008, thanks to European funds, the pardons will remain anecdotal”, he explained to the AFP Pablo Ferrándiz, sociologist and professor at the Carlos III University in Madrid.

Among the many questions, It remains to be seen whether this measure – which will not affect Puigdemont, still on the run in Belgium and still being pursued by the Spanish courts – will advance the dialogue in Catalonia., now ruled by the moderate independentist Pere Aragonès, of the Left Republican Party of Catalonia (ERC).

“Graces are a fundamental part, They are the key that opens the padlock, because the situation in Catalonia was that of an absolute blockade.», Says Oriol Bartomeus, professor of political science at the Autonomous University of Barcelona. Despite this, the “road will not be easy”, he underlines, the separatists clinging to their request for amnesty and organizing a referendum of self-determination, in the face of a Spanish government which rejects them head-on.

However, “the pardons put an end to this fiction” of the 2017 secession attempt and “force the independence movement to leave the ‘trials’ to the past and to propose something,” he concludes.

(With information from AFP)

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