Crisis in Catalonia: resumption of dialogue with Madrid at the end of September

The Spanish government and the Catalan separatists will resume dialogue in the third week of September, the Catalan regional president announced on Tuesday almost four years after the attempted secession of Catalonia, one of the worst political crises experienced by Spain in recent years. decades.

Read also: Pere Aragonès, the new figure of Catalan independence

"

" will take place the third week of September, in Barcelona, ​​declared Pere Aragonès during a press conference in Madrid, where he was received for the first time by the Socialist Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez. This announcement comes a few days after the pardon and release from prison of nine separatists who had been sentenced for their role in the attempted secession of October 2017, a gesture by Madrid aimed at reviving the discussion with Catalonia.

The new Catalan regional president, the separatist Pere Aragonès, thus formalized the resumption of negotiations and explained that subjects such as "

" of the central state in Catalonia

will be addressed

. Pere Aragonès was welcomed in La Moncloa, the seat of the Spanish government, by Pedro Sánchez who had decided on the pardon of the separatists, a controversial measure, and criticized in particular by the right which accuses him of "

»The unity of Spain by making a new concession to the separatists on which its government, which is a minority in the Spanish Parliament, depends in part. A few hours earlier, the Spanish Court of Auditors had demanded some 5.4 million euros from several dozen former Catalan regional officials for advertising the attempted secession abroad.

The Court's report pinpointed the alleged embezzlement of public funds between 2011 and 2017 by pro-independence governments in order to promote separatism abroad.

The attempted secession of this rich region of northeastern Spain with 7.8 million inhabitants was one of the worst political crises experienced by Spain since the end of the Franco dictatorship in 1975. Despite its ban by justice, the regional government of Carles Puigdemont organized a referendum of self-determination, punctuated by police violence.

Read also: Spain: the moderate independentist Pere Aragonés elected regional president of Catalonia

A few weeks later, the Catalan parliament unilaterally proclaimed the region's independence. The Spanish government, then in conservative hands, responded by removing the regional government and putting the region under control. Nine separatist leaders were sentenced to terms of between nine and thirteen years in prison for the attempted secession. They were pardoned last week. The president in power at the time of the proclamation of the Catalan Republic, Carles Puigdemont, is in exile in Belgium.