How spyware allegations are poisoning Spain s ties with Catalan separatists thelocal.es - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from thelocal.es Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
'We have suspected for a long time that we were the target of the state intelligence service,' Catalan leader says amid scandal involving Israeli-made Pegasus software
It is. For Illa’s party, the Spanish Socialist Workers Party (PSOE), which runs the Spanish government with Unidas Podemos (UP) as junior partner, the Catalan independence movement is a graver concern than any virus even one that has so far claimed 52,000 lives.
With reliable opinion polls last month showing that the February 14 Catalan election would return a larger pro-independence majority, PSOE anxiety would have deepened. According to the December survey of Catalonia’s official Centre for Opinion Studies, pro-independence parties would win up to 50.9% of the vote and 77-seats in the country’s 135-seat parliament.
That figure compares with their present majority of 70 seats, won with 47.5% support at the December 2017 Catalan election, following the country’s “illegal” October 1, 2017, independence referendum.