Day 9: weapons of war and lunch in Barcelona
(02/03/2019) Former Home Secretary tells court Catalan Police did not carry out agreed upon plan to stop vote on October 1, 2017.
(Original published: 02/03/2019)
Urkullu: offered bilateral dialogue
Urkullu: protesters were rebelling against Puigdemont
Zoido: Catalan Police did not cooperate on October 1
Zoido: application pending for weapons of war
Benach: Speaker's Committee decides what gets debated
Colau: October 1 vote "was full of self-organised people"
Rufián: "I went for lunch, I went out for a snack"
Dante Fachin: heard "constant appeals to democracy"
Domenech: "the state had moved to a logic of war"
In 2017, the Basque First Minister, Iñigo Urkullu, met with both Carles Puigdemont, on June 19 at Catalan government headquarters, and with Mariano Rajoy, on July 19 at the Prime Minister's Office, Moncloa. Mr. Puigdemont told him there was a situation of "absolute blockade" and requested his help. He also spoke with other people, "all of them aware of the situation in Catalonia".
He spoke on the phone with Mr. Rajoy on September 21, following the events of September 20 in Barcelona. He said the intensity of his contacts with everyone through to October 27 was "extensive" and he offered "4 or 5" proposals in order to avoid both the declaration of independence and the suspension of home rule. "It was all getting out of control", he said: "we had to be very careful about the steps that could be taken".
"The Prime Minister replied that as far as he could he would do as little as possible, and do as much as possible to be careful with everything that was done."
Mr. Urkullu proposed "a space of three months for détente" with bilateral communication, each government represented by three people around a table to talk, "I do not understand actions based on tension".
Mr. Rajoy's attitude "was not a proactive attitude for moving the situation forward".
He believes Mr. Puigdemont did comply with the notification sent by the central government about the suspension of home rule, especially because of the last sentence of the reply sent on October 19, which ended "... to vote on the formal declaration of independence that [it] did not vote on October 10".
There was no negotiation about the self-determination of Catalonia but there was about the possibility of calling early regional elections. On October 26, however, the Catalan First Minister told him he could not comply.
"The protesters were rebelling against him and he could not call elections and avoid the suspension of home rule."
Mr. Urkullu understood there was a real desire for dialogue on both sides, "I would not have accepted to mediate on issues that do not concern me". Mr. Puigdemont did not want to declare independence and Mr. Rajoy did not want to suspend home rule.
He did not speak to Mr. Rajoy about the application of Article 116 of the Constitution, which deals with the declaration of states of alarm, exception and siege.
Gabriel Rufián (ERC) testified he had taken the high-speed AVE train to Barcelona on the morning of September 20, 2017, and that when he arrived "there was quite a lot of confusion", but "it grates when they say it was rebellion because I went for lunch, I went out for a snack".
He was scolded by the presiding judge. "You have not come here to say 'many things'", said Manuel Marchena: "the court is asking you to describe it, not have an opinion on it [...] you are a witness in a court of law".
"The only violence I saw was on October 1", said the MP, "the Civil Guard was beating people", "elderly ladies."
He stated he was "a member of the ANC, of my local library and the video club" and that he did not have "a bloody clue" about the road map to independence.
The judge told Albano Dante Fachin off as soon as he sat down.
Asked what his profession was, the former Podemos leader in Catalonia replied "precarious".
"What is that?", the magistrate asked, cutting off the next reply to remind him that if he planned to continue with his circus, the bailiff would invite him to leave the courtroom.
On the morning of September 20, 2017, the witness was heading to Barcelona by train "to see to several issues" related to his party's preparation for the referendum: "…party members wanted us to call for mass participation on October 1".
He saw "in El Mundo" that searches were being carried out at the regional economy ministry building, "I went there", and he was there from nine in the morning until one in the afternoon, "more or less."
"There were already journalists from television networks, I think it was Antena 3 and Telecinco, on top of the Civil Guard cars."
He heard "the constant appeals to democracy" from the crowd and said he was near the door of the building and had seen "more than a dozen" people come and go "quite normally."
Asked why he had attended the event that day, he answered he was "deeply concerned" about issues that "affected democracy".
Ada Colau, the mayor of Barcelona, expressed "discomfort" to the court at having to answer questions from Vox, which she described as an "extreme right" group.
She was not "physically" at the September 20 rally in Barcelona but received information from her colleagues. She saw "massive, but peaceful" participation.
"I do not remember a situation like this one", she said, "either as Mayor or before". She added "the general situation was very exceptional".
The attempt by the National Police to enter CUP headquarters without a court order "increased" the situation of "social alarm", she said. There was "huge concern" because "fundamental rights, including institutions, could be in danger".
On October 1, "I took part in my dual capacity as a citizen and as mayor" and "I had to make calls as Mayor because there were brutal police charges with voting that had been peaceful".
She told the court that "October 1 was organised by the people [...] it was full of self-organised people" and everything that had been done was "led by the citizens". The "country-wide stoppage" on October 3 "was called by everyone".
What did not seem "spontaneous", she said, was the police action.
Ernst Benach, the Speaker of the Catalan Parliament from 2003 to 2010, two parliaments, said in court that "the function of the Speaker's Committee is to evaluate proposals for motions". Legislative initiatives are put forward by "the government, parliamentary groups or citizens" but not the Speaker's Committee.
"The Speaker's Committee does not judge the content, it judges the way it is presented", he explained, and "the order of the day has been altered many times once the session has begun".
"In the Catalan Parliament there has always been a very large diversity of groups, it only needs one group to ask for a quick reading [of a bill]."
Replying to questions from the Public Prosecutor's Office, however, he admitted it is the responsibility of the Speaker's Committee to approve those proposals, that the Speaker's Committee decides what gets debated in the chamber, and that proposals that are not approved do not reach the chamber.
He explained that in 2010 a proposal for a bill on a referendum was rejected "because it did not meet the formal requirements".
Both the general secretary and the senior legal counsel at the regional parliament help to prepare the committee's agenda, which is "normally" only approved with the knowledge of the chairman of the committee: the Speaker.
In the evening, the longest and most detailed testimony was from Juan Ignacio Zoido, the Home Secretary at the time of the events.
He explained the first contact between the Prosecutor's Office and the Home Office took place as a result of the suspension of the referendum bill on September 7. The Secretary of State began to study sending police reinforcements to the region.
On September 22, following the events two days earlier not only in Barcelona, "but the 41 searches that took place", he notified the regional interior minister, Joaquim Forn, that reinforcements would be sent.
He said 6,000 officers from the National Police and Civil Guard were sent, first of all, and up until the weekend of October 1, to act "in support" of the Catalan Police.
The suggestion that it would have taken 90,000 officers in all to comply with the court order to close and seal off more than 2,200 polling stations seemed to him a "very high" figure.
"I was told they were going to comply", he said, in reference to Catalan police officers, "we were hoping they would reconsider". There were "doubts" but Colonel Pérez de los Cobos, in charge of coordinating policing, "said that in the end they would comply".
"On the 29th, they began to say that the important thing was the referendum, that people could vote."
He denied knowing many details—"I do not design police operations or evaluate them"—or giving direct orders to the National Police or the Civil Guard about what they had to do on October 1.
The defence teams asked him about supposed contradictions in the different court or government orders in the days before the vote but Mr. Zoido said that "what is true" is "there were no" Catalan Police units that day.
"Catalan Police riot units were not seen that day, or they did not see them."
The Secretary of State told him "conditions had not been met" with the Catalan Police, which "was totally inadequate, just look at the evidence". They had not closed "practically any polling stations".
On October 1, police reinforcements entered 131 polling stations, according to the former minister's figures, and "managed to close another 100 without problems".
The actions of officers at polling stations, where there were "some real human shields that blocked access", seemed to him "proportionate" with "a rational use of force to prevent a criminal act".
"Where access was permitted, there was no problem."
"What would have happened if the illegal referendum had not been encouraged, if it had not been promoted…?", he wondered, and if the Catalan Police had acted in accordance with the plan.
Asked for his opinion on the former head of the Catalan Police, he replied: "it seems Mr. Trapero was not very cooperative".
"It would have been totally different", if the Catalan Police had done their job.
In response to questions from the Public Prosecutor's Office, he confirmed that when he was appointed Home Secretary, in November 2016, "there was an application pending for the purchase of weapons, at the end of [20]16 [...] of the type they frequently used, what we call weapons of war, and ammunition".
He said he did not remember if the application included a request for grenade launchers. It was refused: "it was understood that it was not necessary".
The testimony of Xavier Domench (En Comú Podem) lasted only a couple of minutes. As soon as he confirmed before the judge that on September 20 he was in Madrid and not in Barcelona, he was invited to leave the room.
Before doing so, he characterised the trial as "a symptom of democratic failure" and said that during those weeks "the state had moved to a logic of war".
Three other witnesses, Josep Ginesta, Francesc Iglesias and Adria Comella, all described as MPs for Republican Catalan Left (ERC), were called but all stand accused in another, related, case in courts in Barcelona and were therefore entitled not to testify at the Supreme Court. They chose not to.
The trial continues on Monday morning with testimony from nine more people, including the current Speaker of the Catalan Parliament, Roger Torrent, the former senior legal counsel at the Catalan Parliament, Antonio Bayona, and the former central government representative in Catalonia, Enric Milló.