Spain To Pardon Jailed Catalan Separatists

Spain will pardon the jailed Catalan separatists behind a failed 2017 independence bid, Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez said Monday, in a move that could turn the page on a years-long political impasse over the region's separatist drive

Barcelona, (APP - UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 21st Jun, 2021 ) :Spain will pardon the jailed Catalan separatists behind a failed 2017 independence bid, Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez said Monday, in a move that could turn the page on a years-long political impasse over the region's separatist drive.

The Socialist premier said his government had "opted for reconciliation" and believes the controversial pardon -- which will be approved at the weekly cabinet meeting Tuesday -- would "pave the way for this path".

"Someone must take the first step. The Spanish government will make that first step now," Sanchez said Monday during a speech in Barcelona to around 300 members of Catalonia's civil society.

But he fell short of offering amnesty to the group, a move that separatists have long called for, including some in the crowd on Monday.

Manel Cantero, a 59-year-old teacher, said the separatists needed an amnesty because "there's nothing to pardon".

"We exercised a fundamental right," he told AFP, referring to the banned independence referendum in October 2017 that was marred by police violence.

The referendum was followed by a short-lived declaration of independence, plunging Spain into one of its biggest political crises since democracy was restored in 1975 following the death of longtime dictator Francisco Franco.