Spanish PM Pedro Sanchez faces fire for reaching a quid-pro-quo deal with Catalan separatists

In the parliamentary elections held on July 23, Prime Minister of Spain Pedro Sanchez’s Socialists came in second. He has until November 27 to form a viable coalition, failing which new elections will be held.

Requiring the backing of Catalan independence parties, Sanchez has acceded to their requests to grant amnesty to all individuals under investigation for their involvement in an abortive attempt at secession in 2017.

He has put forth a very contentious bill that would offer amnesty.

Conservative opposition parties and judges in Spain have responded by intensifying their criticism, with some charging Sanchez with corruption and betraying the rule of law.

The proposed bill has sparked several days of tense protests in the country this week, with thousands rallying against it in the capital Madrid.

On Thursday the Socialists and the hardline Catalan JxCat separatist party said they had signed an agreement, without providing details. The leaders of both parties are due to speak later in Brussels.

Brussels is currently the base of Catalan separatist leader and head of JxCat Carles Puigdemont, who left Spain for Belgium following the failed secession bid to avoid prosecution.

The proposed amnesty bill sparked several nights of demonstrations this week.

Nearly 7,000 protesters gathered on Tuesday, according to authorities, carrying placards emblazoned with the words “No to amnesty” and “Spain does not pay traitors”, TV images showed.

On Monday evening, several thousand demonstrators gathered outside the headquarters of the Spanish Socialist Workers’ Party (PSOE) in Madrid, Barcelona and Valencia.

On Saturday, Alberto Nunez Feijoo, head of the opposition conservative Popular Party (PP), said at a meeting that “exchanging votes for impunity is corruption” and vowed at a rally in Valencia a day later: “We will defend Spain.”

Feijoo’s PP finished first in the July parliamentary elections but failed to form a coalition.

The opposition accuses Sanchez, who once opposed amnesty, to be willing to do anything to stay in power.

Sanchez has remained defiant in the face of the demonstrations.

In a message on X, formerly Twitter, on Monday he criticised “harassment” by the protesters and said their behaviour was akin to “attacking democracy”.

Members of the judiciary have also stepped up their criticism.

The Professional Association of Magistrates, a conservative body that represents the majority of the country’s judges, last week issued a statement calling the measures “the beginning of the end of democracy” that would “destroy the rule of law”.

After a failed Catalan secession attempt in 2017, hundreds of people were pursued by Spanish prosecutors, sparking claims of repression.

The main leaders of the movement fled abroad, including Puigdemont, or were given jail sentences of up to 13 years.

Sanchez was elected to power just a month after the secession attempt, with the support of separatists. He has made reducing tensions in Catalonia a priority.

In 2021, he pardoned the nine jailed separatists and the following year his government reformed the Spanish legal code to remove the crime of sedition, under which they had been condemned.

(with inputs from agencies)