Spain's Catalan Separatists Claim Victory in Local Parliamentary Polls
by VOA News September 27, 2015
Separatists in northeastern Spain's Catalonia region claimed victory Sunday in local parliamentary polls that could push the region toward a faceoff with the central government over independence.
Nationalist regional president Artur Mas spoke to jubilant supporters late Sunday in Barcelona. "We have won," he told crowds of flag-waving independence backers. He spoke with more than 80 percent of the vote already tallied.
A key exit poll shows Mas's pro-independence alliance 'Together for Yes' falling about five votes short of an absolute majority in the 135-member parliament needed to push toward their goal of independence by 2017. But a smaller leftist secession party known as CUP was shown likely to win another 11 to 13 seats.
Ahead of the vote, the two parties said such a result would allow them to unilaterally declare independence within 18 months.
Under that plan, Catalan authorities envision approving their own constitution, and eventually creating a Catalan central bank and judiciary.
Spain's national government in Madrid had not offered official comment on the outcome by late Sunday.
But it has blocked a series of earlier Catalan independence initiatives, including a 2006 independence declaration that the Spanish Supreme Court ruled unconstitutional.
The central government of Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy has said it will use all legal means to prevent secession -- a move that the European Union has warned could result in ejection from the 28-nation trade bloc.
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