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WORLD NEWSSaturday 12 September
Catalan separatists rally in Barcelona to secede from Spain
JOSEPH WILSON People wave pro-independence Catalan flags, known as the Estelada flag, during a rally call- pendence aspirations must
ALAN CLENDENNING ing for the independence of Catalonia, in Barcelona, Spain, Friday, Sept. 11, 2015. Advocates of be put on hold if backers
Associated Press independence for Spain’s region of Catalonia on Friday launched their campaign to try to elect a fail to win a majority in the
BARCELONA, Spain (AP) — majority of secessionists in regional parliamentary elections on Sept. 27. regional parliament.
Hundreds of thousands of The central government in
separatist-minded Cata- (AP Photo/Francisco Seco) Madrid has consistently in-
lans swarmed Barcelona sisted that independence
on Friday, giving enthusi- directly express their senti- Pro-independence par- of independence for the for the region is unconsti-
astic backing to indepen- ment. ties need 68 seats in the highly industrialized north- tutional. Spanish officials
dence advocates who are But since the central gov- 135-member parliament to eastern region, which has have also said they won’t
hoping to elect a majority ernment in Madrid refused, push forward their agenda. a population of 7.5 million let citizens who live in Cat-
of secessionists in the re- “the only way we can Polls show them on track to and about 18 percent of alonia be stripped of their
gional parliamentary elec- know what the people win a slim majority. Spain’s economic output, Spanish citizenship.
tion this month. want is to use the elections Independence backers could be made by the par- Deputy Prime Minister Sora-
The campaign for the on the 27th,” said the can- say a win would give the liament by 2017, separatists ya Saenz de Santamaria
Sept. 27 ballot began on didate, Raul Romeva. lawmakers a mandate to say.“I am willing to go to told reporters Friday that
the same day as the Cata- start drafting a Catalan the end of this process if we a regional parliamentary
lan National Day holiday, constitution and attempt have the majority of seats majority for separatists
which separatists have secession negotiations with in parliament,” said Artur won’t help them pull the
used for years to rally hun- the central government. Mas, Catalonia’s regional region away, because
dreds of thousands to call A unilateral declaration leader. But Mas said inde- Spain’s autonomous re-
for the creation of a new gions don’t have the legal
European nation. power to do so.
Barcelona police estimat- Polls have shown Catalans
ed that almost 1.4 million overwhelmingly support
people participated but the right for a secession
the Spanish Interior Ministry referendum but are evenly
said the demonstration at- divided over whether they
tracted between 520,000 actually want the region
and 550,000 protesters. to be independent. Polls
The top candidate on a show they are against it if
list representing a block of it means a Catalan state
pro-independence parties would be outside the
told reporters that separat- 28-nation European Union.
ists wanted to stage an in- Protester Noelia Godoy, 25,
dependence referendum a transportation compa-
so Catalonia’s voters could ny worker, said she would
vote for a pro-indepen-
dence party because she
believes Catalonia doesn’t
get back what it pays in
taxes. q
Greece Poll:
Syriza pulling ahead in election run-up
ATHENS, Greece (AP) — The poll questioned 1,300 peo- any seats.
radical left Syriza party of A failure by the party to
former prime minister Alexis ple by telephone and had gain representation could
Tsipras is pulling ahead of complicate Tsipras’ options
the conservative main op- a margin of error of 2.8 per- if he falls short of an overall
position party in the run-up majority.
to Greece’s snap general centage points. Other polls Tsipras resigned barely
election on Sept. 20, ac- seven months into his four-
cording to an opinion poll have shown the two main year term. He triggered the
published Friday. election after Syriza hard-
The poll conducted for parties in a dead heat. liners rebelled over his de-
the left-leaning Efimerida cision to sign a third bailout
ton Syntakton newspaper Friday’s poll shows an im- deal with creditors that re-
showed Syriza at 28.5 per- quired spending cuts and
cent compared to 23.5 provement for both Syriza tax hikes despite his prom-
percent for the center-right ises to end austerity.
New Democracy party. and New Democracy. In The Syriza hardliners have
Nazi-inspired Golden Dawn formed a new party, Pop-
was in third place with 6.5 late August, a similar poll ular Unity, advocating
percent, while 17.5 percent Greece’s exit from Europe’s
of respondents were unde- from the agency had Syriza joint currency, the euro. Fri-
cided or would not answer. day’s poll showed the party
Conducted by ProRata on at 23 percent and New De- at 2.5 percent, not enough
Sept. 7-9, the nationwide to get into parliament.q
mocracy at 19.5 percent.
All polls conducted so far
show no party able to win
enough parliamentary
seats to govern without co-
alition partners.
The nationalist Indepen-
dent Greeks, Syriza’s gov-
erning coalition partner,
was polling at 2.5 percent
— short of the 3 percent
threshold required to win
