Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez said the debate about the future of Catalonia will likely outlast his administration and will require “a lot of dedication, generosity and time.”
In a joint interview with the Guardian, Le Monde and the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, the prime minister reiterated previous comments that his immediate focus was on reducing tension following last year’s illegal independence referendum held by the pro-independence Catalan regional government, which Madrid used harsh tactics to suppress.
Catalan President Quim Torra told reporters in Washington on Wednesday his “first request” to Sánchez will be for the prime minister to agree an independence referendum for the autonomous region. The leaders will meet in Madrid on July 9.
“At last someone sits at our table,” Torra said, adding that Catalonia’s “right to self-determination” would be the dominant theme of their discussions. “If we don’t want to tackle the issue, these meetings don’t make much sense.”
The Catalan president’s five-day visit to Washington is part of his efforts to promote Catalonia’s independence cause internationally.
But Sánchez has repeatedly said that self-determination is not the way froward for Catalonia as it would only divide the region further.
“There’s one bloc — which isn’t a majority — that backs pro-independence parties,” Sánchez said, according to the Guardian. “I think that what the majority of Catalan society wants is a relationship between its distinct region and the rest of the country.”
The prime minister said Catalan leaders should respect the country’s unity and its laws but indicated he was open to revising the powers of Spain’s central and regional governments “once temperatures had cooled [down].”
Speaking ahead of a European Council summit in Brussels, Sánchez also said that Europe needed “a shared response to a shared challenge,” referring to the migration crisis which has divided EU leaders. Earlier this month, Sánchez ordered Spain to “offer a safe port to the people on board” a rescue ship which had been stranded in the Mediterranean for several days with more than 600 people on board after both Italy and Malta refused to let the vessel dock in their ports.