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Spain’s socialist government and Catalonia’s separatist executive on Friday accused each other of breaking off negotiations aimed at easing the secession crisis.
The mutual accusations came after Madrid’s latest proposal for talks caused an uproar among the right-wing opposition and some socialist leaders who accused the government of making concessions to separatists who run the Catalan government and thus yielding to their “blackmail”.
The issue is sensitive in Spain where many reject any leniency towards Catalan separatist leaders who still want independence like their predecessors who tried to secede in October 2017, while Madrid stresses dialogue is crucial to ease tensions.
“This proposal was an attempt to set the dialogue in an ordered, rigorous way, and with conviction,” Deputy Prime Minister Carmen Calvo told reporters.
She said “it was not accepted” by Catalan separatist parties.
“For the moment the situation is stalled.”
She added that separatist parties were asking the government to agree to holding an independence referendum, something which she said would “never be acceptable.”
“When two parties have positions that are so irreconcilable, then you just have to stop. There’s no other solution,” she said.
In a hastily-convened press conference, Catalonia’s separatist government retorted that on the contrary, Madrid had “broken” the dialogue.
“It is the state government that has broken and abandoned the space for dialogue. We didn’t do it,” said regional vice-president Pere Aragones.
“We will continue at the dialogue table.”
– Lack ‘courage’ –
The latest war of words comes just days before the trial of 12 Catalan separatists who participated in the 2017 secession bid begins on Tuesday.
Madrid’s latest proposal was to create a roundtable attended by all political parties in Catalonia to try and ease tensions.
Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez had made negotiations with Catalan separatists one of his priorities after coming to power in June.
Earlier this week, his government proposed the roundtable complete with a special, independent “rapporteur”.
That proposal did not go down well as it was seen as yielding to separatists who wanted an international mediator.
The opposition and some Socialist officials accused Sanchez of making concessions to the separatists merely to pass his 2019 budget, for which he needs the support of Catalan pro-independence lawmakers in the national parliament.
As such, the conservative Popular Party (PP), centre-right Ciudadanos and far-right Vox all called on their supporters to take to the streets of Madrid on Sunday.
PP head Pablo Casado was scathing towards Sanchez after his concession, calling him “a felon,” “illegitimate” a “traitor” and a “compulsive liar.”
Sanchez heads up a minority government, with his socialist party having just 84 lawmakers out of 350.
He therefore needs the votes of Catalan separatist lawmakers — alongside others — to approve his 2019 budget and remain in power until the next general elections planned for 2020.
Elsa Artadi, spokeswoman for the Catalan government, said it was a shame the Socialists had “decided to give in to those who don’t want dialogue” and “lacked courage to move from rhetoric to reality.”