Madrid\/Barcelona
\nCatalan leader Carles Puigdemont failed to clarify on Monday whether he had declared Catalonia\u2019s independence from Spain last week, paving the way for the central government to take control of the region and rule it directly.<\/p>\n
The wealthy region\u2019s threatened to break away following a referendum in Oct. 1 that Spain\u2019s Constitutional Court said was illegal. That plunged the country into its worst political crisis since an attempted military coup in 1981.<\/p>\n
Puigdemont made a symbolic declaration of independence on Tuesday, but suspended it seconds later and called for negotiations with Madrid on the region\u2019s future.<\/p>\n
Spain\u2019s Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy gave him until Monday 10:00 a.m. (0800 GMT) to clarify his position, and until Thursday to change his mind if he insisted on a split – and said Madrid would suspend Catalonia\u2019s autonomy if he chose independence.<\/p>\n
Rajoy had said Puigdemont should answer the formal requirement with a simple \u201cYes\u201d or \u201cNo\u201d and that any ambiguous response would be considered a confirmation that a declaration of independence had been made.<\/p>\n
Puigdemont did not directly answer the question in his letter to Rajoy, made public by local Catalan media.<\/p>\n
The Catalan leader said instead that the two should meet as soon as possible to open a dialogue over the next two months.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur offer for dialogue is sincere and honest. During the next two months, our main objective is to have this dialogue and that all international, Spanish and Catalan institutions and personalities that have expressed the willingness to open a way for dialogue can explore it,\u201d Puigdemont said in the letter.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis way, we will verify the commitment of each of the parties to find an agreed solution.\u201d<\/p>\n
Spain\u2019s Prime Minister office could not immediately confirm whether the letter had been received and declined any further comment.<\/p>\n
A declaration of independence would trigger Article 155 of the 1978 constitution, under which the government in Madrid can impose direct rule on any of Spain\u2019s 17 autonomous communities if they break the law.<\/p>\n
The central government can then sack the local administration and install a new governing team, take control of the police and finances, and call for a snap election.<\/p>\n
The Catalan government says 90 percent of Catalans voted for a breakaway in the referendum.<\/p>\n
But most opponents of independence boycotted it, reducing turnout to around 43 percent.<\/p>\n
Catalan police chief Josep Lluis Trapero was due to appear before Spain\u2019s High Court on Monday to be questioned over whether his force, the Mossos d\u2019Esquadra, deliberately failed to enforce the court ban on the independence referendum.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Madrid\/Barcelona Catalan leader Carles Puigdemont failed to clarify on Monday whether he had declared Catalonia\u2019s independence from Spain last week, paving the way for the central government to take control of the region and rule it directly. The wealthy region\u2019s threatened to break away following a referendum in Oct. 1 that Spain\u2019s Constitutional Court said […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":7912,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[87],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7911","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7911","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7911"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7911\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7913,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7911\/revisions\/7913"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7912"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7911"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7911"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7911"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}