a knife attack at marseilles central train station the attacker was shot dead by security forces after he stabbed two passers by france has been in a state of emergency now since november twenty fifth seeing those are your headlines are up to date stay with us inside story coming up next. violence outside polling stations in spain's controversial. referendum is illegal so how will the government deal with this and can cause independent the. story. hello and welcome to the program i'm elizabeth parata illegal and irresponsible those other words of the spanish deputy prime minister who condemned. the sunday's controversial secession referendum tens of thousands of consonance turned out to vote lead into violent scenes in some parts of. when spanish national police sent from outside the region trying to shut down polling stations and confiscate ballots in madrid the central government said police acted with professionalism and a proportionate way to get to our guests in a moment but first. discussion from barcelona following the police movement from one polling station to the next. i don't turn on polling trying to shut it down to the resist and then home right now they're out. but if you can see them down now i was talking to move on. to the crowd. that charge from the crowd from those national photos. now remember that this guy come from other areas of maine to catch a load of the specific crimes out on this referendum how early i don't know was too much heard around the door and they drag. that goes away and i am going to. come here now. to tell them what is your reaction when they want it's already out i mean this is a terrible thing it's completely unfair we are a nation we want to vote we will be free they cannot. do with us on this is completely outrageous. the international community should react to that who out of the people who are honest people we won our country free they are gone it's over that was just love it he's a us you talk tough but cattle man he wanted a vote here today and now the spanish national riot police always drawing from this area see if we can get a picture of these people coming up now. that we have seen at least one person taken away with injuries off the scuffles with police many people camping outside the education ministry in tia's because they weren't able to vote and because of the way that the spanish national riot police came in this just to show you the level of police presence here we're just going through here and i'm going to show you the line. and this is this is the spanish national police. because this is one of the borders. around the city of barcelona. coming to a polling station after polling station to try and shut the referendum down as you can see they're now getting back into their vans. well our correspondent john hendren spoke to the leader of spain's catalonia region and asked him what he thinks of the central government using police force to stop people from voicing maybe. you have seen images of a. spanish. people. in various points of spain where police convoy celine's were going saying go on get . those images what you define will reflect what the policy of the government. that they have no interest in making us feel comfortable with in spain you have people to pay no no because they're here for them it's almost like a private piece of property. and we're going to go go against you because how can you dare can come to beg you want to leave. your history will judge this almost scandalous absence of political negotiation this is. irresponsible the spanish government has almost acted like. an arsonist has been putting. putting of. wood on the fire it's been acting as. totally responsibly. well let's bring in our panel who all join us from barcelona today and rick martinez is a political analyst and sagna. is a lecturer at the university of barcelona specializing in conflict security and defense welcome to you all dr martinez if i can start with you and what we've seen today pictures of riot police smashing glass doors to go inside polling stations and confiscate ballot boxes why did the spanish government go to the lengths a did today to stop this vote and how is the violence acceptable. goes over the fall of the guys i am a leveling board as if all of the got almost. this fall they inspired some raw authorities by extremists from both. the right wing extremist but not always all of them and there's always. people from us going through from germany from italy from the foreign european grounders here who have to organize riots. fortunately we have a world frame. work for. all these people who are going. to be proportionate in the use of going over all police behavior they have been quite. soft. who was the is the most vocal in us saying what the deputy spanish prime minister said today miss on those let me bring you in here because i can see that you don't agree at all with what dr montana's is saying happened today no i'm x. absolutely astonished by the words from dr martinez. all i have seen is police beating all people people who were sitting on the floor was peacefully entering schools where kids and families where they're just sitting down to prevent ballot boxes from being taken away police using absolutely. proportionate violence type of violence that i've seen in other places in the world and you would never expect in your country and the images i've seen and the ones i'm speaking inside the schools there were no people from outside no groups who had come from other parts of spain or europe at all saying that this is proportion and it's not only being unfair but it really worries me about lot can someone who thinks disproportionate and feel that it's a police role in a democratic state because if this is what day believe it's proportion and against citizens i think we really have a problem as a country and as i want to bring you in here because the same that we have seen so far in our news rooms have been violence carried out by security forces so if i can say that again you completely disagree with what miss. is saying there has been a lot of criticism so far from people around the world of how the spanish government the lengths they've gone to the heavy handed tactics they seem to have taken to stop this vote. here we are the funding the magazine we are defending the most of the rights for everyone for all. it's really important that we preserve the quality freedom so that it be as well as union and cooperation with different people people with different backgrounds living through weather here in missouri we had a. universal town and we we but the proud of of. living together in peace. some couple of thousands perhaps a thousand of them is coming from from from other european countries came here are cool for for trouble for too long in all of. these women are very well trained. as what do you basing that on that is alison's of extremists from other countries have come to spain what are you basing that on. you know for me the only form from from france from the us going to. the other two well well there are famous for their thirty's that they would use for nearly forty years. yes how are they are very small numbers on the bullies these are the mccarthy bullies is definitely able to deal with you know better proposal no marks of a soft as possible fashion miss on the if i can see that you want to come in but just before you do let's have a look at some of the history and how we've got here the desire for independence has a long history in catalonia and is driven by a mix of economic and cultural factors sunday's voyage is the second referendum in three years catalonia is an ne in spain and has a population of seven point five million people it accounts for twenty percent of the country's economic output and its capital barcelona is a major tourist destination. have their own distinct culture and identity which existed for centuries before being fully brought in under spanish rule and seventeen fourteen the identity was said to be suppressed by spain particularly under the military rule of francisco franco from one nine hundred thirty nine to one nine hundred seventy five but since the one nine hundred seventy nine statute of autonomy the region has gained more powers it has its own parliament police force and control over education the push for full autonomy appears to have gathered pace and recent years most notably after spain's debt crisis we're going to bring in a new guest now in the story about a boss alone a base writer who is in favor of independence must a story about very good to have you with us on the program given what we've seen today at least thirty eight people injured the scenes of violence was the referendum a success. well they did they come and take it to the government catalonia is he saying is three hundred people injured yeah i think the referendum is being a success in terms of the mobilization of people to about i actually did go down and see people outside one of the polling stations and there were thousands of people who actually managed to repel back to lease when the police came to see to stop the voting and there was a festive feel in the street people obviously angry and upset and but you know the the figures are that most of the most of the polling booths are operating that there are the ballots that people can vote that there's a universe of census which is around people that you can vote in their local po polling station to be able to go to another polling station and it's very clear that masses of people have gone into the street before the summer it was expected that only half of the cannon population were going to vote and i think we'll find that by the end of today the percentage of people who will have voted will be much higher miss on those how what do you think the percentage the turnout will do for catalonian independence. dreams because the spanish government has done everything it can to keep the turnout low so given that what a low turnout would it with the votes still be legitimate if it was a low turnout. unfortunately it's a very very uncertain senario because as you said the side is doing as much as it can to prevent the voting happening so i'm not i really have no idea of what's happening in other parts of catalonia i've just been walking around the city today and i know some schools police has gone in and taken away ballot boxes so those boxes are not going to be in the counting anymore so but i think definitely something like participation it's going to be much higher than it was expected maybe even last not because of this repression that we're seeing would you please allow me to say that i really apologize to all just euro audience for having to listen to want to martinez just said before. i really regret that speech is like. a voice to go because what it was so silent oh my me what exactly is it that you george agree with what he's saying before i give him a chance to ask critical as i've been with the point of and his movement on the printer pendants politicians i am an electoral observer myself i've been very critical about all the. desirable conditions of the election today regarding the polling tables who is there how people received their call for voting there was no clear campaign i've been very critical about everything but i think speaking off today being proud of our police men being well trained i am a professor of the catalan please myself. what we are saying it just makes me be very ashamed as a citizen and i'm i just came back from seeing some police actions and i just couldn't help crying now if someone is proud of this it just makes me feel very first rate it because maybe this person does not believe democracy the way i believe he's just repeating the same messages that we heard two weeks ago on al jazeera in the stream about solidarity democracy. between peoples i could agree on all that but trying to diminish the repression we're seeing today here as european citizens it absolutely makes me wonder if let me bring dr marshall martin is. our game and if we're playing a game a game has some rules if i break the rules you don't want to play with me. for example as the cricket but dr nyce you know we're not talking about cricket we're talking about the and friends i'm from rome is the spanish government is the government and we're trying to play a. different thing is that is the government in madrid playing by the rules you know the other side of lawyers is the government we've got some riots in the square dr martinez is the government in madrid playing by the rules here as are always looking to do enough if you're looking for a problem of the school i don't think dr martinez can hear me so let me go to. mr starr about miss on dolls was talking about some of the flaws in this referendum so far i want to ask you about the question itself a simple yes or no when surely the issue is much more complex than that surely though there are costs lands that have a lot of pride in their identity but. maybe not want to secede from spain and have greater autonomy what happens to them did this referendum cater to the variety of views in catalonia. the question will be how many people have voted if they say that this referendum is big as the support for having a referendum in catalonia and eighty percent of the current population say they want to represent them whether they want independence or not then clearly this will be a democratic mandate for the cattle and government and the catalan people to take a decision over whether to be an independent state or not i'd probably disagree with and read about it they know it's description of democracy as a game because it's not a game that democracy is about people having the right to decide over their future it's about majorities actually making a choice over their future and you can't force people to be in a state they don't want to be in especially when that state today is using the violence of the kind we've just seen that you have been using rubber bullets against people some of the looks like they've lost and are and i there's been massive charges against old people and young people they've been smashing through the doors of schools. in many schools and a mandate that children are going to go to school and they going to ask the teachers. teacher who who smashed the door in the vasco and the teachers were after and said it was the police now i don't see how we can talk about this is a game of think it's quite sick and we can even suggest that dr martinez i'm going to try coming back to you i know you've had some trouble hearing me but we have you know. and miss i don't i was saying that this is the model as i was saying this is that i was ready this is not democracy this is a this is a fake game this is a game with force this is not serious this is not out on the market they have all this thought out of that i'm is a tautology thirty one isn't nice i'm sorry please do not respond so i don't want to you know. i mean today hasn't just happened you know back in i will right now. because i will likely be out in the square i don't like the reality but. i'll see what i am seeing my only see a little boy listens with me to listen to mr starr's watch adams will come back to you. for coming back to do so in this time but please continue. so i mean you know. today's an organization the referendum comes after house a visit attacks against the referendum seven hundred miners being threatened with various. websites being taken down ballot box being see. there's been you know government ministers you know charged and friends. and so activities. just as i was this people involved in for economic mess a story about a man in a little bit of trouble hearing you so let me go to a message now on. some of the things that you are talking about the conditions around the referendum we've heard from the cuttlebone your president col is push him out has been very critical of the silence on what's been happening why haven't we heard more from the e.u. do you think about what's been happening around this referendum. the european union it's a union of states and therefore it's. theoretically logical from a state perspective to first respect states over any t. and second in spanish we have a phrase that says when you see your neighbor having the cart just put yours in a safe place which means almost every state in the european union has a richer and it would potentially want to become independent so i think it's logical that does not mean it's like g t made but i think it was logical until now that the european union tried to be very calm and quiet hoping that this would be solved in a reasonable way dr that has not happened and sorry go ahead i'm going to bring in dr martinez now miss on the if catalonia becomes an independent state what you're you know you're very clear on that you are against wonder spain withhold its support for catalonia joining the e.u. and if so on what grounds i mean what kind of action can we expect from the government at madrid at this point. as i said before i left wing or the go commentator i mean favor of workers' rights here think of the lonely we have been suffering for more than formerly known as forty forty years forty years we have been suffering a lot of this came in a show we have been suffering sort of. like africa is committing i guess i got a feel for government and know how to measure a lot who are not nationalists we're in favor of international is solidarity equality of. their freedom to. of course we are very much in favor of the european union that the. continental set of. rights for all or i talk to my colleagues i think it was a little bit much for your we don't there are lot is far more subtle was not doing what i'm saying even if i'm all i would like to bring in now because i can see again that you really enjoy and agree with what you're hearing here well i just i cannot even allow that like how can he dare to mention upward height in catalonia really like as a professor of international conflicts i've seen people who really suffer and struggle around the world occupy countries occupied people speaking or even daring to mention in any of both sense because i've also heard some catalan people saying that qatar only has been occupied from spain if they had lived in a country they would know what it is havel at mentioning height ok. mr starr but i'll just like to bring you in here. where to from here. where we go from here yes. i think they will be a massive vote today even though the state has mobilized all its forces to try and pretend they send used quite harsh violence against peaceful protesters i think that because of that they see the kalam government will be able to actually move towards a declaration of independence i think that is now a lot plate and can i just say it's not just crime independence people that are being hit by police on the streets of boston and now there are a lot of people that are touting against independence or voting in back in the referendum people that they want of all out assaulted by the police for trying to vote on this in this referendum or are seeing. spanish flags queuing up to vote as well and they're also having their democratic rights denied this is not about catalans versus spent and it's a complete representation of the conflict that's a story that we thank you very much for your time on this i'm afraid that is all the time we have i would like to thank all of guests to enjoy the n. is editor luke starr bought and sagna on the all joining us from boston line a thank you very much for your time and thank you for watching you can see the program again any time by visiting our website al-jazeera dot com and for further discussion go to our facebook page that facebook dot com forward slash a.j. inside story you can also join the conversation on twitter handle as at a.j. and 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