Catalonia’s regional executive will launch a major campaign in Madrid and Brussels next week to promote and defend the use of Catalan as an official language in the European Union, Catalan Regional President Pere Aragonès announced on Thursday.
“Next week, we begin a second level in this offensive to defend Catalan as an official language in the EU,” Aragonès told the press after an event held at Bologna University, El Periódico reported.
Aragonès, who met the former EU Commission president Romano Prodi in Bologna, announced on 12 October, also Spain’s National Day.
The political-linguistic strategy, described by Aragonès as an “offensive”, starts next week in Madrid, where Meritxell Serret, Catalonia’s regional minister for Foreign Action, will meet with EU ambassadors in Spain.
Among the demands made by Catalan separatist parties to support the reappointment of acting Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez (PSOE/S&D) is that Catalan be made an official language in the country’s parliament, which has already been achieved and in EU institutions, a goal that Madrid has pledged to support, including financially.
Separatists also demand that Madrid give the green light to a referendum on self-determination for Catalonia, pass an amnesty law for those involved in the 2017 secessionist attempt, and transfer more powers to the region, including managing commuter trains.
A celebration “based on armies”
Aragonès, of the separatist Republican Left of Catalonia (ERC) party, announced that his regional government will use its network of offices abroad to promote the Catalan language, particularly in Brussels, with the help of the central government.
Madrid’s support “is a recognition of Catalan uniqueness and identity”, said Aragonès, who put the number of Catalan speakers at 12 million.
On the other hand, he explained his absence from the events marking Spain’s National Day, since – in his opinion – it is a celebration “based on armies” and on the conception of the “Spanish State with a single thought with a single language and a single culture”.
The 12 October celebrations took place in a highly politicised atmosphere due to the ongoing negotiations between Sanchez’s PSOE and the Catalan separatists, whose parliamentary support will determine whether the acting prime minister remains in power for another four years – in a coalition with the progressive platform Sumar – or whether a new general election will have to be held in January 2024.
As he arrived at the National Day celebrations, Sánchez was booed by a group of people expressing their rejection of the government’s amnesty law and its negotiations with the separatists.
(Fernando Heller | EuroEFE.Euractiv.es)
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