MOSCOW, November 1 (RIA Novosti) — Catalan authorities could file a complaint with international courts over Madrid’s refusal to allow an independence vote, Catalonia’s government spokesperson warned on Saturday.
“Once all legal roads on the Spanish soil are exhausted, the Catalan government will go to international courts,” the regional government’s official Francesc Homs said in an interview with Catalunya Radio.
He condemned Madrid for “manipulating” the law “as it sees fit” and said this behavior must be exposed internationally.
On September 27, Catalan President Artur Mas called an independence vote and signed a decree scheduling a referendum for November 9. The Spanish government vowed to block the motion by appealing to the Constitutional Court, and on September 29, the court suspended the referendum while it deliberated on its legality.
Artur Mas then stated that the voting in November will not be carried out as an official referendum, but rather as a questionnaire to find out public opinion.
Catalonia is a Spanish region with a high level of cultural and political autonomy and its own regional parliament. It has a population of about 7.5 million people, and accounts for a quarter of Spanish taxes.
Separatist tendencies have been fueled by the economic crisis in Europe, as this region recovered faster than the rest of the country and even helped the central government.
