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80 years after the Spanish Civil War broke out, there are still 4,912 missing victims and more than 5,000 families continue to search for their relatives. The Hospital Vall d'Hebron in Barcelona has started to perform genetic tests on relatives of the missing in order to identify remains buried in mass graves. In the past two weeks, specialists have taken samples of the saliva of 80 elderly people in Barcelona. Most of them are siblings or children of the victims of the Franco regime. Isabel Domènech, a 79 year-old resident of Santa Coloma de Gramenet (a municipality near Barcelona), was two years old when her father died at the end of the Civil War. She has been looking for him for many years and claims her right to know where his remains rest: “it is the minimum we ask for”. The DNA profiling programme announced by the Catalan Government last September has requested more than 1,100 people to do these tests throughout the four Catalan provinces. The genetic profiles obtained will be cross-referenced with samples from the remains found and those which are still yet to be found in mass graves.  

Barcelona and Seoul will be connected through three direct flights per week from the 28th of April 2017. The Catalan Minister for Business and Knowledge, Jordi Baiget, announced this Wednesday that next year Korean Air, the largest airline in South Korea, will operate three flights - on Monday, Wednesday and Thursday - with capacity for 248 passengers each. The company currently operates flights to 129 destinations in 46 countries and in 2015 registered around 25 million passengers. Baiget detailed that the negotiation process to achieve an agreement started two years ago, on a trade mission and institutional trip of the Catalan Government to South Korea, and explained that the airline will extend the frequency to four days in the future “if things work well”.  

“The Spanish Government is maintaining its judicial offensive against the Catalan Government and no one is sitting at the table but the Government of Catalonia”, reported the Catalan Government spokeswoman, Neus Munté, this Tuesday. The statement comes after Catalonia’s Supreme Court (TSJC) notified the president of the Parliament, Carme Forcadell, that she will have to testify on the 16^th of December for allowing the pro-independence roadmap to be put in vote on the 27^th of July. Forcadell's case and the prosecution of the organisers of the 9-N symbolic vote held in 2014 are not an exception, but rather an example of the monopolisation of the Catalan question in the complaints issued by the Spanish Government to the Spanish Constitutional Court (TC). According to the data offered by Munté, the TC has 18 pending appeals issued by the Spanish executive against Catalan laws and 27 more issued by the Catalan Government for conflicts of competences.

The new delegate of the Spanish executive in Catalonia, former MP Enric Millo, took office this Monday. The representative from the Catalan branch of the conservative People’s Party (PPC) assured that he is “willing to dialogue” and emphasised his predisposition to “reduce the distances” between the Spanish and Catalan institutions. He also insisted on the need to respect the Spanish Constitution, adding that it can be “modernised” but “through dialogue and consensus rather than through imposition”. The Catalan Government’s spokeswoman, Neus Munté, described Millo as a person “who is well aware of the Catalan reality” and admitted that “it wouldn’t be difficult” to find changes compared to Millo’s predecessor, María de los Llanos de Luna, regarding the predisposition to dialogue.

The Catalan Government paid tribute last Sunday to the 309 victims and their families that have been recognised as victims of Franco’s regime since 2009, the last time such a ceremony took place. During the event, which took place in Universitat de Barcelona’s auditorium, the Catalan Minister for Foreign Affairs, Raül Romeva compared “with due respect to the obvious differences” the justice of Franco’s dictatorship and that of the current Spanish State. “Today there are still echoes of the Francoist melody” he said, referring to the “interference of the Spanish Government in the judicial system”. Moreover, Romeva stated that despite having overcome the Francoist dictatorship, which reigned in Spain from 1939 until the dictator’s death in 1975, it still has to be proved whether Spain’s democracy “is worthy of the name”.

According to a study released this Thursday by the Catalan Ministry for Economy and Tax Office, the “autonomic framework” does not leave “enough room” to cope with poverty and inequality in Catalonia. ‘Economy note 103: Analysis and tools to tackle poverty and inequality’, a report that includes 19 extensive articles from around 30 experts, technicians and academics, stresses that the scope of the Catalan Government’s public policies is limited by “the restrictions on powers and availability of income of the current autonomic framework”. In the same vein, Catalan Vice President and Catalan Minister for Economy and Tax Office, Oriol Junqueras, said that this situation has forced him to prepare a budget for next year “that is neither the one Catalans deserve nor what they need” because it does not correspond to the “economic and fiscal effort” made by the citizens.

The Catalan Government may sanction the energy company Gas Natural Fenosa over the death of an 81-year-old woman, who died on Sunday night in a fire at her home in Reus. All evidence points to the victim, whose energy supply was cut off two months ago, being affected by energy poverty and illuminating the flat with candles. Indeed, the candles appear to be the cause of the fire that burned the mattress where she slept, according to the investigation carried out by the Catalan police, Mossos d’Esquadra. Municipal sources explained in a press conference this Tuesday that the Social Services of the City Hall were not aware of the woman’s lack of electricity due to a non-payment, as they didn’t receive any request for financial assistance, nor a notification from the supplier. Gas Natural now has a period of five days to respond and prove that it fulfilled the established protocols, otherwise the Catalan Government will fine the company.

There will be an allocation in the 2017 budget for the pro-independence referendum, which the Catalan Government will carry out “regardless of the situation”. Thus, the Secretary for Tax Office, Lluís Salvadó, responded to pro-independence CUP’s demands to call a referendum in 2017 even if the Spanish Constitutional Court (TC) could ultimately appeal or suspend the bill. “The Catalan Government has a univocal commitment and the referendum will go ahead”, he stated this Tuesday in an interview with TV3. “We will do it in one context or another”, he added. The bill for 2017, which received CUP’s support last Saturday, also increases social expenditure by 989 MEUR in comparison to the amount allocated for this purpose in 2015. The Government is determined to approve the budget for 2017 and bring the bill before Parliament on the 29th of November.

Many representatives from the Catalan Government attended on Sunday the demonstration in Barcelona to defend the Catalan institutions from Spain’s legal attacks. “The rally empowers the institutions to continue the process towards independence”, Catalan Government Spokeswoman Neus Munté stated. The politician referred to the demonstration as “the best contrast between the decay of a political system, the Spanish one, which persecutes democracy, and one nation and the Catalan institutions that stand up for it and which will continue to do so”. “Any true democrat should feel challenged by what is happening”, she added. Several Catalan Government representatives are facing court cases sought by the Spanish Government for having staged the 9-N vote in 2014.  Those politicians summonsed include Catalonia's former President, Artur Mas, the Parliament’s President, Carme Forcadell and former Catalan Ministers, Joana Ortega, Francesc Homs and Irene Rigau. All of them attended the protest. 

The arrest of Berga’s Mayor and pro-independence radical left CUP member, Montse Venturós, for refusing to take down a pro-independence flag from the town hall building has strained the relationships between the Catalan Government and its partner CUP. Hence, the Catalan Executive’s Spokeswoman, Neus Munté urged CUP “not to fall into the trap” and keep “unity unflawed” amongst pro-independence forces. Munté’s statements especially referred to CUP MP Eulàlia Reguant’s comments which suggested that the relationship between CUP and the Government “could face some difficulties” after Venturós’ arrest. In a similar vein, CUP MP and Venturós’ lawyer, Benet Salellas, accused the Catalan Ministry for Home Affairs, which is responsible for the police, of obeying an order from the Spanish justice which “is against Catalonia’s pro-independence process”.

The Catalan Government Spokeswoman, Neus Munté, expressed this Friday the Catalan Executive’s disapproval of the arrest of the Mayor of Berga, Montse Venturós, for refusing to take down a pro-independence flag from the town hall building. Munté considered it not only “outrageous” but “an aberration both from a political and democratic perspective”. However, the case showed the different in criteria between the Catalan and Spanish institutions. While Munté lamented Spain’s “prosecution” of elected representatives and the “judicialisation of politics”, the Spanish Executive assessed the arrest as “only normal”. In his first appearance as Spanish Government spokesman, Íñigo Méndez de Vigo warned that “whoever fails to adhere to the rules has to accept the consequences”. 

Montse Venturós testified before a judge on Friday morning for not taking down an independence flag from the town hall building. The Mayor of Berga was arrested by police and taken to court after failing to attend voluntarily on two occasions. She is accused of an electoral crime and disobedience for ignoring the Electoral Roll Office’s requests to take down the flag from the façade of the Town Hall on two election days: the 27th of September Catalan election and the 20th of December Spanish general election. Her arrest caused an outcry amongst pro-independence parties and also those in favour of the right of Catalonia to hold a referendum on independence. Talking to journalists after testifying before the judge, Venturós confirmed her commitment to the “popular mandate” towards independence and said that her arrest was “a new attack on the Catalan people” by “an absolutely anti-democratic” Spanish state. The Catalan Government has described the arrest as “outrageous”.

Catalonia’s demand to hold a referendum and the imputation of several Catalan representatives were two common issues during the last part of the second day of the debate to elect a new Spanish premier. The divergence of opinions between the Catalan pro-independence forces and the Conservative People’s Party were once again evident. While the current Spanish President, Mariano Rajoy, denied the judicialisation of the Catalan politics and expressed his “willingness to dialogue”, despite the Catalan Government policy of “all or nothing”, the spokesman of the Catalan European Democratic Party (PDECat), Francesc Homs, accused PP of being “the motor of the Catalan disconnection”. Mariano will have to face two more days of debate to be invested as President, as the politician will predictably lose the vote taking place this evening. 

The Public Diplomacy Council of Catalonia (DIPLOCAT) and the ‘Institut de Ciénces Politiques Louvain-Europe’ (ISPOLE), organised this Tuesday an event entitled “Catalonia: A New State in Europe?” at the Catholic University of Louvain (UCL) located about 50 kilometres east of Brussels. The conference included the presence of Amadeu Altafaj, Representative of the Catalan Government to the EU, Michel Liégeois, President of ISPOLE and Michael Keating, Professor of Political Science at the University of Aberdeen and Director of the ESRC Centre on Constitutional Change, amongst other experts. However, all the attention turned to the public when a supposed student claimed to represent Spaniards and Catalans which were absent and questioned the objectivity of the event. Later on, Laura Martínez Bocos admitted to speaking on behalf of the Spanish Embassy in Belgium, where she holds the rank of Counsellor.

The Catalan President, Carles Puigdemont and the Parliament’s, Carme Forcadell, received this Tuesday the notice issued by the Spanish Constitutional Court (TC) which suspends the conclusions of the Committee to Study the Constitutive Process. Four deputy clerks delivered the documents which warn that if the Parliament and the members of the Parliament’s Bureau ignore the resolution they “will be liable for responsibility, including criminal charges”. The TC also urges the Public Prosecutor to proceed with the corresponding actions against Forcadell. Last August, the TC suspended Catalonia’s pro-independence roadmap, ratified by the majority of the Parliament, claiming that the conclusions of the Committee to Study the Constitutive Process, the group responsible for designing Catalonia’s strategy towards independence, violated the Spanish Constitution.