With vigils and concerts outside prisons, Catalan independence supporters for months have shown their backing for 12 separatist leaders who go on trial on Tuesday over their bid to break the region away from Spain. Now that the highly anticipated trial is finally about to get under way at Spain’s Supreme Court in Madrid, they have vowed to step up their protests in another show of solidarity. While just 12 leaders will sit in the dock over their role in the failed 2017 independence bid, many Catalan separatists feel they are also being put on trial for having taken part in a banned referendum held on October 1 that year.
“I’m a lifelong separatist and I voted on October 1, it’s as if I was being tried,” said retired teacher Eugenia Fernandez at a recent vigil held for the detained Catalan leaders at the picturesque Plaza de la Vila de Gracia square in Barcelona.
Nine of the leaders have been charged with rebellion, with some also accused of misuse of public funds. They have all been in pre-trial detention for months, some of them for more than a year.
“This is a reaction against the brutality of this trial, which is not against a few people but is instead against Catalan political feeling,” said award-winning Catalan writer Ramon Solsona, who read some poems at the vigil.
Similar events have been held across the northeastern region, where the leaders have obtained near-martyr status among many separatists who see them as “political prisoners”.
The 12 defendants face prison sentences of between seven and 25 years if convicted.
Catalonia’s president at the time of the secession bid, Carles Puigdemont, is not among those on trial since he fled to Belgium where he regularly receives visits from top Catalan separatists.
Polls show the region remains split over the issue of independence, and separatist protests — which in the past drew over a million people — appear to have lost strength.
Pro-independence groups have responded by holding smaller events to show support for the detained separatist leaders.
Separatist parties and associations have vowed to stage a wave of protests during the trial, starting with demonstrations on February 12 and 16 in Barcelona, followed by a general strike across Catalonia on February 21. A major protest is scheduled in Madrid on March 16. — AFP
Daniel Bosque
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