Don't forget, don't forgive: Catalan Nationalist Youth pays tribute to the Catalonia's President executed by Spain 83 years ago

At dawn, as 83 years ago, the Catalan Nationalist Youth was in the Castle of Montjuïc whre the Spaniards shot the Catalonia's President lluís Companys. Serveral leaders of the main patriotic party Junts (Together) as former Catalan Speaker Laura Borràs and former politicals prisoners and MPs Jordi Turulll and Josep Rull attended the event. 

Arrested by the Gestapo, executed by Franco, still a convict in Spain today.

At dawn on October 15, 1940, Lluís Companys, then President of Catalonia, was put before a firing squad in the moat of Montjuic Castle in Barcelona and shot. The detail of soldiers executed the sentence of a court martial, pursuant to regulations recently imposed by General Franco's fascist regime. The German Gestapo had handed over to their fellow Spanish Secret Police only a few months earlier a 58 year old man who represented a country they wanted to ridicule in defeat and to teach a lesson for the future.

Exiled in France after the victory of General Franco in the Spanish Civil War, he was arrested by the Nazi secret police in La Baule-Escoublac (Brittany) on 13th August 1940, an arrest witnessed by a policeman who had come expressly from Spain. Mr Companys was first interrogated by that officer at La Santé prison in Paris, he was placed under his custody and taken to Madrid, where he was tortured.

On 3rd October, the President was transferred to Barcelona to be summarily court-martialled. He was sentenced to death —with a shot of macabre fascist irony— for "participation in a military rebellion", in a one-day trial and without even meeting the few legal guarantees to be observed under the dictatorship.

He was shot immediately afterwards, on the morning of 15th October 1940, at Montjuic Castle where he had been taken and tried—on the mountain where the Olympic stadium that now bears his name stands. President Companys was the only democratically-elected government leader in Europe to have been executed in the twentieth century, and is still today the symbol of Gen. Franco's persecution of Catalan Republicans.

 

Special Edition: Lluís Companys, October 1940 123rd Catalan President executed by Spanish government 

 

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Waiting for Spain’s apology

In the summer of 1940, during the dictatorship of Franco, the exiled Catalan President Lluís Companys was detained in France, and was then taken by French and Gestapo officers to Francoist authories in Spain, who executed him. This 15th of October will be the 74th anniversary of his execution.

On 15 October 2008, the Commission on Dignity and the Vice-President’s Office of the Generalitat of Catalonia put together an Act of Amends to ex-President Lluís Companys, along with the Consul of Germany, Christine Gläser, and the Consul of France, Pascal Brice read more...

Catalonia's President Lluís Companys

Arrested by the Gestapo, executed by Franco, still a convict in Spain 2014.

At dawn on October 15, 1940, Lluís Companys, then President of Catalonia, was put before a firing squad in the moat of Montjuic Castle in Barcelona and shot. The detail of soldiers executed the sentence of a court martial, pursuant to regulations recently imposed by General Franco's fascist regime. The German Gestapo had handed over to their fellow Spanish Secret Police only a few months earlier a 58 year old man who represented a country they wanted to ridicule in defeat and to teach a lesson for the future.

Exiled in France after the victory of General Franco in the Spanish Civil War, he was arrested by the Nazi secret police in La Baule-Escoublac (Brittany) on 13th August 1940, an arrest witnessed by a policeman who had come expressly from Spain. Mr Companys was first interrogated by that officer at La Santé prison in Paris, he was placed under his custody and taken to Madrid, where he was tortured read more...

Lluís Companys' Legacy

Companys is sitting while he waits in the living room. They tell him that someone just knocked on the door. “Lluís, les allemandes sont arrivées!” (Lluís, the Germans are here). Calmly, he turns the page of the book he is holding and keeps reading. The members of the German police find him in his chair, reading Vies des saints (Lifes of Saints). Being as he is a liberal politician, of strong unionist convictions, his reaction is profoundly telling. He could have fled many days ago, but he's tired. Besides, he has important reasons for staying in France. His son, Lluïset, ill with schizophrenia, disappeared from the French mental hospital he was in after a bombing by the Germans forced it to be shut down. What will men be capable.... read more

74 years of national and democratic humiliation

On August 13, 1940 began what would become a dark chapter in the history of Catalunya. The Franco regime was about to perpetrate a unique crime: the murder of a democratically elected President. Six men stormed the residence of Lluís Companys, President of the Catalan government, at La Baule in Brittany. He was captured by four men in German Nazi police uniforms and two civilians. One of them was Pedro Urraca Redueles, officially a police attached in the Spanish embassy in Paris, in reality a spy paid by the Franco regime to serve as liaison with the Gestapo and the Vichy Regime and to coordinate in part the repression of Spanish republican exiles in France. On that day Lluís Companys started a journey that would end tragically two months later, on October 15, 1940, with his execution in Montjuïc, Barcelona, after an illegal ... read more

Franco's persecution of the Republican refugees in France

Just after Hitler’s armies had defeated France, Franco's Government took advantage of the victory of its Nazi allies and began to act against the Republican exiles in French territory. On the one hand, it tried to destroy all the organizations that the refugees were maintaining in exile and to expropriate their properties and documentation; on the other hand, with the collaboration of Germany, it tried to get various Republican personalities who were in the "German-Occupied Zone" arrested and transferred to Spain, while getting others who were in the Vichy "Free Zone" arrested and extradited ... (read more)

Help Catalonia is an association that receives no subsidies whatsoever from the Spanish state, the Catalan government or indeed any other organisation. We, the people who work in this project, do so on a voluntary basis and for no financial gain whatsoever.

 

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60,000 mark the fifth anniversary of the 1-O, the self-determination referendum held on 2017 and deepens the ERc's sinking

The event organized in Barcelona this Saturday to mark the fifth anniversary of the 1-O, the self-determination referendum held on October 1st, 2017 was attended by 60,000 people. What was most evident was the vast divide separating the thousands of people who gathered in front of the Arc de Triomf in defence of the validity of the referendum, and Catalonia's Republican Left (ERC) political leadership that has abandoned the 1-O.​​

In fact the dismissal of vice president Jordi Puigneró (Junts) by president Pere Aragonès (ERC) only three weeks after the Diada demonstration from which the ERC leadership absented itself, is already clear. The first signs were given at the very start of the event, when it was recalled that the Spanish state's repression had, among other consequences, led to the situation of there being five people in exile who were unable to come personally to Barcelona. The names of Lluís Puig, Clara Ponsatí and Toni Comín, from the Junts space, received loud applause, and this multiplied when the name of Carles Puigdemont was read, prompting a shower of praise and chants of "president". Only one of the figures in exile was criticized: the name of the ERC general secretary, Marta Rovira, provoked jeers among the public.

The ERC space also could not avoid the crowd's derision, a few moments later, when senior ERC figure Carme Forcadell went on stage. During her speech, calls of "traitor" and "out" were heard among the public:  "Many of you are angry, disappointed and disillusioned. I understand that and I share it.", she said. But it 's too late. Her party is sinking day by day. 

Carles Puigdemont and the ANC get all the warmth

Carles Puigdemont, the president-in-exile, who spoke live via telematic means, was enthusiastically welcomed by an audience that, for long periods, remained silent listening to his words. A tranquility that was broken after several messages from Puigdemont, such as his "immense thanks" to the citizens who made the 1-O possible, his warning that those "delusional undertakers" should give up any hope that the people will forget about independence, and his defence that "there is no need to repeat" any referendum because the 2017 one is still valid, as opposed to the "clarity" proposal of the Catalan president, Pere Aragonès. Even his appeal for the unity of the independence movement was well received: "The only table to which we must chain ourselves is the dialogue table between the siblings of Junts, ERC, the CUP, Òmnium and the Assembly". Unlike the other speakers who spoke along these lines, Puigdemont was applauded. 
The Catalan National Assembly (ANC), as well, was welcomed with open arms. In her speech, Dolors Feliu saw how her strategy, marked by the desire to put an end to the dialogue table with the state and start a new democratic attack in the short term, was strongly applauded. Her criticism of the "immobility" of the parties was warmly received by the public, as well as her call to "open new paths". Thus, the ANC president returned to the threat of a early election and a civil list, bypassing the parties, if the Catalan government does not comply with its pro-independence mandate.

Appart from the Barcelona's event there were meetings all over Catalonia and a rally in Girona where hundreds burned the ERC's effigy portrait and a Spanish banner.

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Enough is enough: 15 City Councils in Northern Catalonia will fight to recognize the right of councilors to use Catalan

On Friday, it was announced that the Elna City Council would go to trial following the decision of the councilor plenum to modify the municipal regulations to recognize the right of councilors to use Catalan, as long as the interventions are fully translated into French. The Intermunicipal Union for the Promotion of Occitan and Catalan Languages ​​(SIOCCAT), that there are at least fifteen northern Catalan municipalities that will also introduce Catalan into the municipal regulations. If nothing else, there are Banys and Palaldà (Vallespir), Espirà de Conflent, Estagell (Rosselló), Formiguera (Capcir), la Menera (Vallespir), Tor de França (Fenolleda), Pesillà de la Ribera (Rosselló), Portvendres (Rossello), Ralleu (Conflent), Sant Andreu de Sureda (Rossello), Sureda (Rossello), Tarerac (Conflent), Trillà (Fenolleda) and Vingrau (Rossello). 

Some of these councils have already received a threatening letter from the prefect demanding that they back down, and, according to SIOCCAT sources, some councils have already given up. Rodrigue Furcy, prefect of the Department of the Eastern Pyrenees, justifies the ban on Catalan by adding that article 2 of the French constitution says that the language of the republic is French. He also argues that French courts have ruled several times that plenaries in a language other than French are illegal.

Nicolas Garcia, Elna's Mayor for the PCF

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International report concludes that the Spanish repression in Catalonia inspires dictatorships

A report by UNPO concludes that the Spanish repression in Catalonia inspires dictatorships. The 40-page report explains how lawfare and repression in Spain against Catalonia have inspired:

1. Charges of treason in Ghana against West Togoland separatists (intensifying from 2019).
2. The abuse in Algeria of counterterrorism to silence the self-determination of Cabilia (2021).

 3. The use in Pakistan of counterterrorism legislation against minorities (2020). 4. Russia's labeling of Crimean Tatars as extremists and terrorists (2019).
5. The suppresion in Turkey of Kurdish activists. (2020) 

6. The use of spy software in Iran against the Kurdish community.

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The Council for the Republic becomes the Council of the Republic

This Sunday, September 18, an in-person Plenary meeting of the Assembly of Representatives was held in Canet de Rosselló, Northern Catalonia (under French rule). Respecting the established Agenda, the General and Operating Regulations were debated and approved with 93 votes in favor.

Spokesman Pere Cardús spoke on behalf of the report that he has drawn up on the General and Operating Regulations of the Council for the Republic. His intervention has opened the process of debate and amendments. Cardús recalled that the Assembly of Representatives "does not aim to make codes per se but to make an independent State in the form of a Republic". Cardús explained that the Regulation "is a facilitating document, made for understanding and cooperation" and that it will help the Council "to understand us and not to watch over us".

The speaker explained that the Regulation is a text that must also facilitate "a system of understanding between the Government, Local Councils and the Assembly of Representatives" and that it must allow "to draw up a joint strategy for all the bodies of the Council for the Republic ". During the debate on the amendments, the speakers convinced the Government and ended up withdrawing the amendment on the name of the Council. So, the change in the nomenclature of the republican institution has been approved: the Council for the Republic is now called the Council of the Republic. The Government has asked for a special speaking turn to warn that this change will be, in logistical terms, progressive in the coming months.

32 new Local Councils become official once President Puigdemont has given them the Letter of Commitment

The legitimation steps for a Local Council, regulated in the Framework Document for the Impulse of "Local Councils for the Republic", are as follows:

- first, transversal people from a locality/village/district come together and create a driving group 

- afterwards, they are in charge of deploying the Local Council in their local area (networks, territory, local institutions...).

- once the Local Council is present in the locality, an open process is carried out with the citizens and a democratic board is chosen with the tools that the Council makes available to them. 

The local Councils for the Republic that have already signed the "Letter of Commitment" drawn up by the Council for the Republic, which determines, among other issues, the political objectives and purposes of the local Councils and their principles of operation, will receive it signed and in hand by the President of the Council, Carles Puigdemont, at this event.

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Anniversary of the infamous Decree against the Catalan identity of the genocidal Primo de Rivera prohibiting the Catalan flag or Catalan language with death penalty

 

"Sir: Of the evils that most demand urgent and severe remedy is the feeling, propaganda and separatist action that is being carried out by audacious minorities, who not because of being evil, but precisely because of being evil, offend the sentiment of the majority of Spaniards, especially those who live in the regions where such serious evil has manifested itself". This is the meager statement of reasons for the Decree entitled "La Represión del Separatismo" in reference to Catalanity signed by the genocidal dictator Miguel Primo de Rivera (father of the founder of Falange) on September 18, 1923. A piece of legislation that wanted to eradicate Catalan independence and which the historical archive of the BOE does not allow to see interactively.

The Decree promulgated just after the coup two days after the commemoration of the Day of the Eleventh of September 1923 that established the Military Junta as government in Spain, was designed to "purge before the virus that represents the the least confusion, the smallest misunderstanding in sentiments in which there is no need to allow them, and which no people or State conscious of its security and dignity admits or tolerates".

To do so, the decree established the death penalty for separatist "public resistance", correctional prison sentences and extremely high fines, of up to 5,000 pesetas at the time, for "the dissemination of separatist ideas through teaching, or the preaching of doctrines". As well to hoist flags that were not the Spanish one, therefore prohibiting the Senyera (Catalan flag) or prohibiting speaking in Catalan. After all, the Decree established military trials "against the unity of the homeland, when they tend to disintegrate it, reduce its strength and lower its concept, either by word, in writing, by the press or by any other mechanical or graphic means of advertising and dissemination, or for any other act or manifestation".

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The EU Comission denounces Spain: No rule of law as it is failing to comply the 61 % of the ECHR rulings

The Kingdom of Spain is failing to comply with the rulings of the ECHR, with 61% still pending, EU Comissioner for Justice, Didier Reynders reminds, and the average time of pending implementation is over three years. Spain is a deficient democracy where human rights don’t really matter.

The European Commissioner for Justice, Didier Reynders, in response to a question from Spanish MEPs, recalled that on January 1, 2022, Spain had 23 main judgments of the ECHR pending compliance. "On that date, the percentage of main judgments handed down during the last ten years and pending compliance in Spain was 61%, and the average period during which the judgments had been pending compliance was three years and one month", add.

Reynders recalls in his written response that compliance with the judgments of the Strasbourg Court, in particular with regard to the main judgments, is an important indicator of the functioning of the Rule of Law in a country, and that the report on the Rule of Law drawn up by the Commission has included this year for the first time an overview of the application of ECtHR judgments in each State.

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We're back: Massive political demonstration for Catalonia's Independence attended by 700,000 people

700,000 people gathered in the annual National Day pro-independence rally in Barcelona, according to the the organizing grassroots organization, ANC.  local police. Thus, the march was joined by 300,000 more people than last year, when the organizers estimated that 400,000 had marched in the streets. According to local police, the figure was 150,000, which is also higher than their calculations in 2021.

Every September 11, the attendance in the demonstration has been one of the key facts to know the level of engagement among Catalans over the independence campaign. The rally in 2014 marks the peak number of attendees, with 1.8 million, according to the local police, which stood for almost a quarter of the total population in the country. Yet, these numbers have been declining especially after the referendum and independence push in October 2017, with the pandemic also playing its role.

The rally began in Paral·lel avenue and ended in the Estació de França station, by the Ciutadella Park, where the Catalan parliament is located. The atmosphere was at all times cheerful and peaceful, with chants of independence, against governing parties, and some attendees supporting exiled president Carles Puigdemont. You can see some pictures of the rally here at the Catalan version of VilaWeb.

Independence or elections

When the event ended, ANC’s president Dolors Feliu demanded “independence or elections” to the two parties in cabinet, which are also favoring a split from Spain. During her speech, she said that 5 years after the 2017 independence referendum many people have run out of patience and she hinted at the creation of a new party, while many rally-goers spontaneously chanted “government, step down.”

Yesterday’s rally and Feliu’s ultimatum imply a move forward by the ANC in a delicate political moment, when ERC and Junts are negotiating a way not to derail the government agreement, although Junts is considering the possibility of leaving it. There is still a lot of legislation ahead, although next year there will be local and Spanish parliamentary elections, and a possible economic recession is looming and will shake the foundations of all political institutions.

President Aragonès did not attend the rally “because it is against [pro-independence] parties and not against Spain.” This is a major evidence that campaigners for a split with Spain are divided between those prioritizing talks with Madrid, including Aragonès, and those who say confrontation would be a much more effective way ahead. Indeed, the official manifesto for the protest, organized by grassroots organization ANC, criticizes the handling of the independence campaign by the parties leading it. It is the first time since 2015 that a Catalan president fails to attend the march.

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The United Nations’ (UN) Human Rights Committee: Spain violated political rights of Catalan national minority leaders

 The United Nations’ Human Rights Committee has stated that Spain “violated” the political rights of four formerly jailed Catalan leaders, convicted for their roles in organizing the 2017 referendum on independence.

The opinion was released on Wednesday and refers to the fact that former vice president Oriol Junqueras, together with former ministers Raül Romeva, Josep Rull and Jordi Turull were stripped as MPs before having been convicted in October 2019.

During their pretrial detention, the four former Parliament members brought their case to the Committee, alleging that their suspension from public duties, prior to any conviction, violated their political rights under Article 25 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. In October 2019, the four of them were convicted of sedition, a crime that does not include the element of violence, as opposed to rebellion, and their suspensions were lifted.

Taking note that the four complainants had urged the public to remain strictly peaceful, the Committee considered that the decision to charge them with the crime of rebellion, which led to their automatic suspension prior to a conviction, was not foreseeable and therefore not based on reasonable and objective grounds provided for by law.

“The Committee took an important step in affirming that the safeguards against the restrictions of political rights must be applied more rigorously if these restrictions occur prior to, rather than after, a conviction for an offence,” said Committee member Hélène Tigroudja. “The decision to suspend elected officials should rely on clear and foreseeable laws which establish reasonable and objective grounds for the restriction of the political rights, and must be applied based on an individualized assessment. Such an approach and safeguards are the best way to ensure respect for institutions and to promote the rule of law in a democratic society,” she added.

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Hundreds of people gather in Folgueroles and burn Spanish flags

The event was called by the Civil Disobedience movement and consisted mainly of fun events (theatre, debates, music with Musicians for Freedom). Catalans for Independence, the Committees for the Defense of the Republic of Osona and Action for Independence have participated in the events. Among them some hooded men have entered the town hall where they have unfurled a banner.

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Thousands rally to live fully in Catalan language in Majorca, València and Barcelona

One hundred people have claimed this Saturday, April 2, in Palma, the "right to live in Catalan." All in the framework of the mobilization organized by 17 entities. This was explained by Carles Cabrera, the Secretary of Linguistic Normalization of the STEI Intersindical, one of the 17 entities that joined the mobilization. In statements to the media, he stated that "this Saturday's rally, organized by Enllaçats per la Llengua, in all Catalan-speaking territories, aims to claim the normality of this language in the Balearic Islands in order to live fully in Catalan."

In Barcelona a crowd of thousands people rallied against the political agreement to reform the Language Policy Act. This is the agreement signed by PSOE, ERC, JxCat and En Comú Podem, which states that Spanish "is used in the terms set by the language projects of each center" and from which JxCat ended up being demarcated. The protest began in Plaça de Sant Jaume and advanced through the center of the Catalan capital to the gates of Parliament, in the Ciutadella park. A police cordon guarding the building was waiting for them there.

First there was a rally, convened by the platform Enllaçats per la Llengua under the slogan ‘Enough’ and demanding to live fully in Catalan. After the reading of the manifesto, the demonstration convened by USTEC, COS, Intersindical, the Federated Associations of Families and Students of Catalonia (aFFaC) and the Student Union of the Catalan Countries (SEPC) . Trade unions (USTEC-STEs, Intersindical, CGT and COS), students (SEPC), families (aFFaC), with the support of organizations (ANC, Omnium) and platforms in defense of the language (CAL, Platform for the Language), have promoted the demonstration this Saturday afternoon in the center of Barcelona in defense of the Catalan school model and against the political agreement signed by ERC, Junts, PSC and Comuns which they consider puts an end to language immersion.

In València, the mobilization had the support of Decidim, ACPV, STEPV, Plataforma per la llengua, Juga en Valencià, COS and Escola Valenciana and was joined by more than a hundred people.

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