Stupor in Catalonia Over Spanish Judicial Abuse
Jordi Oriola Folch on the latest from Catalonia.
In order to form a government of PSOE and Sumar (centre and left) and avoid one of PP and VOX (right and extreme right), they made a pact with eight parties, with 179 seats, representing 12.3 million citizens. The Catalan pro-independence supporters, essential to achieve the pact, demanded, as an initial condition, the approval of an amnesty law that would deactivate the judicial repression with which the high judiciary, motivated by its exacerbated Spanish nationalism, has persecuted Catalan nationalists (500 people have convictions or pending trials). The PSOE, which is also very nationalist and which rejected the amnesty, did a U-turn after the elections and accepted the amnesty in order not to lose the government.
The amnesty law is not being accepted by Spanish nationalism, so we will see how it will be applied, but in reality what would have been fair would have been a process of nullification of the cases, admitting that the Catalan independence supporters had not committed any crime in organising a referendum on self-determination and that the accusations against them were part of the “lawfare” (instrumentalising justice for political ends) used by the state against them. Then the police officers who improperly attacked the referendum voters could have been tried. The amnesty, on the other hand, annuls the crimes that are understood to have been committed by both sides, but the fact is that the pro-independence side acted democratically and committed no crime, while the state acted outside the law.
Although the amnesty is unfair to the pro-independence supporters because it attributes crimes to them, what makes Spanish nationalism mad is that, being the strong side, they cannot win and humiliate the weak, as they have always done. As the state is the strong party, its approval of the amnesty implies that it implicitly accepts that it played dirty with the illegitimate aim of trying to destroy a perfectly legitimate political movement.
The Spanish Congress ensured that the law was unambiguous because it was certain that the judges would try to interpret it in a distorted way against the Catalan pro-independence supporters. As it is not possible to grant amnesty to specific individuals for the fact that they are pro-independence (in fact being pro-independence “was their crime”), specific crimes were amnestied, in the context of the Catalan independence process, with some exclusions: embezzlement (with personal enrichment or affecting the financial interests of the EU), high treason (with “an effective use of force against territorial integrity”) and terrorism (“that has intentionally caused serious violations of human rights”).
The law, passed on 7 March, was rejected by the right and judges, and former President Aznar said that “whoever could do something against the amnesty law, should do it”. A manual on how to paralyse the application of the amnesty law, ignoring the spirit of the legislator, was distributed to all judges from the official email of the General Council of the Judiciary (the highest body of the Spanish judiciary), which nullifies the rule of law for Catalan pro-independence supporters.
As for the crime of high treason, Judge Joaquín Aguirre does not want to grant amnesty to those accused of the secret plan that, according to him, the Catalan independence movement had with Putin to destabilise Europe. He himself has made statements to German television, spreading secret information from the case to discredit the accused.
Nor did judge Manuel García-Castellón want to grant amnesty to Puigdemont and seven other people (who had gone into exile in Switzerland) for the crime of terrorism that he attributed to demonstrations in 2019. Fortunately, the judge was forced to close the case, but not because of the application of the amnesty, but because of a procedural error. Five of the defendants were finally able to return from exile.
Nor is there any desire to grant amnesty to the seven young men who, in 2019, were arrested for terrorism in an impressive police operation that made all the news, seemingly in an attempt to influence the elections that were to be held two months later, by insinuating that the peaceful Catalan independence movement had swung towards terrorism. Information and decontextualized pieces of video footage of the interrogations were leaked to the press in a serious breach of the secrecy of the case file. After the elections, they were released on bail. Would they have been released if they were really terrorists? The judge has decided not to grant amnesty and to take the case to the European Court of Justice, which will further delay their final acquittal.
As for embezzlement, the Supreme Court rejected the amnesty and will keep the arrest warrants against Puigdemont, Comín and Puig (with charges of 12 years in prison!) in force. They argue that the politicians embezzled in the organisation of the referendum with “personal enrichment” because, although they did not keep a single euro, they can be considered to have saved from putting up personal money. They also argue that they would have harmed the financial interests of the EU.
The judges never specify the amount embezzled because they would not even know what to record, but the fact is that in 2017 the finances of the government of Catalonia were intervened by the Madrid government, and the finance minister Cristóbal Montoro of the PP already assured that no public euro had been used to finance the referendum. In reality, there was no embezzlement of any kind because the referendum was carried out on a voluntary basis and with private funds.
Moreover, the judges want to justify financial damage to the EU, using an EU directive that has not yet been approved (!) and that refers to appropriating European economic funds, which was not stated in the 2019 Supreme Court ruling, but now they argue that there was.
The positive thing is that, in this pronouncement of the Supreme Court, five magistrates have voted in favour, but one magistrate, Ana Ferrer (unequivocally anti-independence), has voted against because she considers that, by not granting the amnesty, the interpretation of the law is being twisted and sees the danger of this implying a condemnation of Spanish justice by the European Court of Human Rights.
At the moment, amnesty has been granted: on the one hand, 20 activists and 4 Catalan public officials and, on the other hand, 50 Spanish police officers. It is doubly insulting that the amnesty cannot be applied normally to peaceful Catalan pro-independence activists, but is instead applied to the police officers who attacked them.
And the most serious thing on a human level is that the Spanish population, except for the Catalans, is justifying the abuse of justice against the Catalan independence fighters, because the media have dehumanised them and presented their objective as totally unacceptable. By taking rights away from the Catalans, they are feeding the beast of fascism. This beast, which worries the EU, has been attacking the Catalans for centuries, and now that Catalonia is claiming political rights, this fascism is accepted across the board in the Spanish state without any objection.
In Catalonia, it has caused stupor that the high magistrates are not applying the amnesty law as it is written, but as they see fit, in a kind of judicial coup d’état against the Spanish parliament, and that nothing will happen to them for doing so. If even the Constitutional Court allows them to do so, there will be no way to stop them in Spain, and they will have to resort to European Justice, where the cases will be delayed for years. The only solution is for Catalonia to be like Andorra or Portugal, a new state in Europe.
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Portugal, a new state in Europe?It was founded in 1143AD. After England/Scotland its the oldest state in Europe.
As for Andorra it’s never been a ‘nation’ like Monaco/Lichtenstein/Isle of Man its a medieval anolomy.
As Spain is a member of the EU, good luck with persuading your masters in Brussels to allow Catalonia to become independent from…..Madrid? But I assume the author would want Catalonia to remain in the EU so both countries would still be ruled by Brussels. Independence in the EU? For better or for worse there’s no ‘independent’ country in the EU, that’s the whole point of it.
ROFPML. Another Brexiteer who thinks that agreeing the amount of water that should be allowed in sausages with 27 other countries for the sake of trade amounts to giving up sovereignty.
Maybe you could be the first Brexiteer ever to tell me 3 EU laws you disagreed with pre-Brexit John. So far, the only fool who attempted it gave the impression he couldn’t sleep before Brexit due to the 5% tampon tax.
Hi Tom,
Are you claiming that the countries of the EU are sovereign?
If so what’s the point of the EU.
Best regards
John
Pooled sovereignty
I’m sorry editor but anyone who follows this site knows that John Learmonth talks utter evidence free bollocks about climate change and Palestine so why are you surprised when he talks nonsense about the EU and sovereignty.
I am all for allowing everyone to express their view but you allow John Learmouth to come onto your site day after day and talk utter rubbish. He then gets attention from people pointing out he is talking shite. The problem with this is not only do you indulge his obvious narcissism but you allow him to distract from other people contributing views to this site.
If I wanted to read about JL’s evidence free views I would go and visit the online section of the Daily Mail or Express.
I agree with John, but not John Learnmonth.
Yes, I am John. As it stands the EU is a trading club. 27 countries agree on laws that allow them to trade seamlessly and chip in for a civil service to implement the laws. Had we been an independent country in the EU when oil was discovered do you think the EU would’ve had the power to franchise out our oil and fritter the money away? Something the colonial master will also do with our renewable energy potential if we don’t escape them soon.
‘As it stands the EU is a trading club. 27 countries agree on laws that allow them to trade seamlessly and chip in for a civil service to implement the laws.”
Where to begin?
Why then was the EU so upset with Polish judicial structures, structures which in no way imperilled ‘seamless trade’?
Why then is it so outraged at Orban’s ‘independent’ political line; which in no way impedes ‘seamless trade’?
Why then did the Spanish PM recently assert that 70% of national legislation “is in fact derived from Brussels”?
Your above description may or may not have applied validly to the Common Market, but in no way does it reflect the current reality of the EU.
Tom
The EU is more than just a traditional trading organisation. The working of the single market and single currency means there has to be more alignment of laws and practices. In addition it is not unfair to say that there are agreed commonalities in some aspects of law based on common values. The current tension with Poland and Hungary have arisen where these countries do not seem to accept these common values.
There is however an enormous leap to say that the EU countries are not independent nations. Indeed the high handed manner in which Spanish government were able to act against Catalonia independence movement without EU interference exhibits how much freedom individual countries have (& a degree of hypocrisy from western EU members?).
There is no comparison between the power to act on behalf of Scottish electorate an independent Scottish government would have in EU (with pooled sovereignty) and the lack of meaningful power the current devolved government at Holyrood has within UK.
Hi Tom,
That’s fine but I think the Greeks might disagree along with the Italians/Poles/Hungarians…..the list goes on.
Surely the people’s of the ‘independent’ countries of the EU should be allowed a regular (say every 10 years) plebiscite as to whether they want to leave or remain.
As you (like me) wish to see the people of Scotland to have the opportunity to decide our futures surely the people’s of Europe should also be allowed a similar democratic choice. Do you agree or is the EU forever?
JL – have you heard of Article 50 or have you been living in a vacuum for last 10 years.
Do yourself a favour and google Article 50 and you will learn that any member can trigger Article 50 in line with the country’s own constitution.
From what I know Orban refuses to take his share of migrants, is that what you’re referring to? As John says they could always trigger article 50. What’s it got to do with trading? If one country expects every other country to make them a special case (as the UK did) does that not give that one country an advantage? If they do leave then they’ll find out (as the UK did) that tackling the problem at a European level is the sensible thing.
John, if there’s a majority in the country for leaving then they should get a referendum. Scotland should only have an independence referendum if 50%+ of votes are cast for independence supporting parties.
Tom – the obvious difference between EU and Westminster on leaving the EU or UK is that the EU accepts the decision to remain or leave rests entirely with the government of the nation state not the EU. In contrast the ultimate decision on whether to hold an referendum in Scotland rests not with the government in Scotland (elected by electorate in Scotland by PR) but with Westminster (elected by electorate 90% of whom live outside Scotland).
Exactly John. We’re an English colony.
Your plausible, if debatable, final point would have been greatly enhanced had you had the generosity to cut the author some linguistic slack.
In which case you would have realised that not only is your initial indignation re-Portuguese nationhood quite misplaced but you might also perhaps have avoided the error of being simply, if egregiously, wrong in 3 of the 4 subsequent cases cited.
Though had this website troubled both to proof read and simultaneously to improve on the somewhat stilted English used here, casual readers might have been motivated to read the article to the end. Something which I, despite I would claim, a far higher motivation than most to persevere, found challenging.
Brussels won’t impose “Belgian” language to Catalan schools.
Brussels won’t take 20,000,000,000 euros each yeat of Catalan taxes.
Brussels won’t leave 70% of investments unexecuted.
Brussels won’t kidnap Catalan Presidents, politicians, or activists and jail them for years.
Madrid did, does and will do.
Although Scotland is not shackled by a written constitution like the Spanish model this article is a useful indicator of how political manipulation of the law is an essential tool of Unionists supremacists. The Union has to be dissolved so that the U.K. Supreme Court’s power ends on the day Scotland dissolved the Union. We are fortunate that we don’t have a formal constitution or basic law as part of the U.K. It’s just a pity that our politicians have not grasped the advantage that gives us.
The suppression of supporters of an independent Catalonia in 21st century was quite an eye opener as was the laissez fair attitude of EU to the actions of Spanish government.
The historical background and circumstances surrounding the independence movements in Catalonia and Scotland are very different. Comments made by some politicians eg Lisa Nandy, trying to make a comparison between Catalonia and Scottish independence are inflammatory.
Similarly the fight for Irish independence cannot be directly compared to case for Scottish independence because the background and history differ.
Each independence movement is to some extent unique to the country involved. This shouldn’t preclude learning lessons from other countries route to independence especially if UK state continues to refuse the right of electorate of Scotland to decide its own constitutional future.