Mick Barry (Cork North Central, Solidarity) | Oireachtas source

Last Sunday, the former President of Catalonia, Mr. Carles Puigdemont, was arrested in Germany on foot of a European arrest warrant. He had been in exile since October and Catalonia's declaration of independence and he faced charges from the Spanish state, including the charge of rebellion. He was arrested when his car pulled into a petrol station in northern Germany, following a spy operation carried out by 12 agents of the Spanish state who had a tracking device on his car and used geolocation on his friend's mobile telephone.

Last week, on 21 March, the day before the EU Council summit commenced, a Spanish Supreme Court judge brought similar charges against leading Catalan politicians, bringing the number of such politicians facing these grave charges to 25. On Friday, 23 March, while the EU Council met, five of these leading politicians were jailed and another was forced into exile, bringing the number in pre-trial detention without bail to nine. These are political prisoners. The number of such politicians forced into exile has climbed to seven.

The charge of rebellion in the Spanish legal code makes reference to public and violent uprising. There was no public and violent uprising. I myself was in Catalonia on 1 October, the day of the independence referendum. I witnessed a huge number of people coming out peacefully queueing outside polling stations to cast their votes. There was violence on the day; it was exclusively at the hands of Spanish state police who used batons, rubber bullets, plastic bullets and so on. This violence has been repeated in recent days. The protests in Barcelona during the last several days and in other Catalan towns and cities were attacked by Spanish state police. Some 89 were injured. That was the figure I saw, which has probably risen since then. Police fired live ammunition into the air. The ghost of General Franco lives on. In the upper echelons of the Spanish state there are strong echoes of the type of Francoist repression and attitudes that prevailed 40 years ago.

By the way, this does not just apply to repression in Catalonia. Recently, we saw the jailing of the Spanish rapper Josep Miquel Arenas Beltran, whose stage name is Valtónyc. He was imprisoned for three and a half years by the Spanish Supreme Court because of his song lyrics, which according to the court included defamation against the crown. He joined another rapper who had been jailed for two years and a rap collective which had been jailed for two years and a day. The extra day is a technicality to extend their sentence.

This was happening while the EU Council met. The arrest of Mr. Puigdemont was on the Sunday after the EU Council summit, but the other events took place the day before and while it met. What did the leaders of Europe say? Nothing. What did the EU Council say? Nothing. What did the Taoiseach say? Nothing at all. The Taoiseach and the other Governments of Europe have everything to say about the possible, perhaps probable, actions of the Russian authorities, but nothing to say about the actual actions of the Spanish authorities. Double standards, by any standards.

Is it any wonder that in Barcelona on Sunday night the crowd marched to the European Commission offices and chanted "This Europe is shameful"? It is far from being a defender of democratic rights or the rights of small nations, as we often hear in this House. Just look at Catalonia. In conclusion, April 15 has been named as a day of protest in Catalonia. Unions and civil society organisations are getting behind that. I hope that turns into a general strike and I think we will see a general strike in Catalonia in April. We send that movement solidarity and greetings. We call for the release of all political prisoners, for a general strike in Catalonia against repression, for an end to capitalism, for a socialist republic of Catalonia with the rights of all minorities guaranteed and for the unity of the working class, for a socialist and voluntary federation of the peoples of the Spanish state.

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