{"id":26400,"date":"2018-12-21T10:25:50","date_gmt":"2018-12-21T10:25:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/?p=26400"},"modified":"2018-12-21T10:25:50","modified_gmt":"2018-12-21T10:25:50","slug":"catalan-protesters-block-roads-over-spanish-cabinet-meeting","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/?p=26400","title":{"rendered":"Catalan protesters block roads over Spanish cabinet meeting"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

Protesters angry about Spain<\/a>‘s Cabinet holding a meeting in Catalonia have blocked a major highway and dozens of roads in the region, disrupting traffic to and from its capital.<\/p>\n

Pro-independence supporters called the protests on Friday to show their disgust at Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez’s decision to lead his weekly Cabinet meeting in Barcelona.<\/p>\n

The Catalan regional government, led by a coalition of pro-secession parties, is also supporting the protests despite an agreement with central authorities to work on a solution to the political crisis that has festered since Catalonia’s failed secession attempt last year.<\/p>\n

After their second meeting since both took power earlier this year, Sanchez and Catalonia’s president, Quim Torra, issued a joint statement on Thursday calling for dialogue to settle the conflict over the future of the northeastern region.<\/p>\n

“Despite the notable differences about its origin, nature and ways of resolution,” the statement said, both governments “share the commitment for effective dialogue that is linked to a political proposal that has the backing of a large part of Catalan society.”<\/p>\n

That outcome was beyond the low expectations that had been placed before the talks, when disagreement over their scope and format kept officials negotiating until the very last minute.<\/p>\n

But despite the progress, distrust prevailed. Security in the prosperous northeastern region, normally in the hands of the Catalan police, has been reinforced with hundreds of anti-riot officers sent by Spain’s national police forces for Friday’s ministers’ meeting.<\/p>\n

The venue, a 14th-century Gothic palace in downtown Barcelona, was shielded with various security cordons and fences, with anti-riot police and vehicles keeping protesters away from it.<\/p>\n

There were moments of tension early Friday when regional Mossos d’Esquadra officers used batons to disperse protesters and open a major road near Barcelona’s port.<\/p>\n

Sanchez, who has been harshly criticized by the right-wing opposition for his meeting with Torra, wants to send the signal that the Spanish government should be able to hold its Cabinet meeting in anywhere in Spain.<\/p>\n

He has also presented the visit as “a way of showing affection to Catalonia.” But many separatists see it as a provocation, coming a year after a snap regional election called as a way out of last year’s independence attempt.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Protesters angry about Spain’s Cabinet holding a meeting in Catalonia have blocked a major highway and dozens of roads in the region, disrupting traffic to and from its capital. Pro-independence supporters called the protests on Friday to show their disgust at Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez’s decision to lead his weekly Cabinet meeting in Barcelona.…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":26401,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-26400","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-middle_east_news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26400","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=26400"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26400\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/26401"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=26400"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=26400"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=26400"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}