Catalan news : Burning King's Photos & Bombing the Greens

Catalan independence news these days seems to be focussed on a prison sentance passed on a protester who burnt a photo of the King of Spain last September 13th whilst Juan Carlos Bourbo y Bourbo was in Girona to open the science park there. A crowd of protesters had attended the event as part of the wider "300 years" movement which aims to raise independence hopes on the anniversaries of the beginning and end of the war of Bourbon succession between 1707 and the 11th of September 1714. That of course was the war which saw the European alliance supporting the Catalans (& British by they way) lose to the Bourbon dynasty (& the Basques by the way) which still holds the crown today. & that was when they lost their powers to raise tax & sundry other privelages.

Yesterday a bomb was difused in the headquarters of the Catalan Green party ICV-EUA which is a sister party of the Spanish state's IU or reformed marxists (who are linked to the SWP by the way)

Yesterday I dealt with the annual irritation & morbid fascination which a display of His Majesty's air force brings to the city where I live & long ago made my home. I can't say I marvelled at the assorted bombers and the most expensive toys which are the current pride and joy - Eurofighter typhoons, F18's & French made Mirage jets which all fly around twice the speed of sound & thus announce their presence a split second before they can incinerate your village. Indeed to the contrary they piss me off more not for their obvious "superiority" to a RAF helicopter with its dodgy doors as was seen at the Galway air show, but in contrast to the the police choppre which seemed tantalisingly close to my little bow & arrow from the vantage point of my roof (& infamous antenna array) the day before (Saturday) as thousands of chirpy Catalans marched to revindicate their liberty of expression & if that means burning photos of the King & shouting Katalans have no King & Katalalalaland is no Kingdom , these fighter jets are just out of reach.

But seriously Saturday was a demo for the liberty of expression in the face of Police repression.
& I'm all for that. http://barcelona.indymedia.org/newswire/display/318279/...x.php

The King has the sort of jets a Burmese general would wet his khaki pants for.....or so they'd have you believe. I of course am leaning to the theory that Burmese generals are nothing more than stage prop of mirrors who hide some nasty lab. You'd swear hte King doesn't really care about Catalans burning his photos, but as last week's Catalan TV's impersonator satire show dealt with amusingly - the Crown is above the King. They had shown Juan Carlos looking through his photo album & deciding to burn his own photos of him with Franco or him on the gargle some night. Bingo no sooner had he done it, the door opens and Minister Saura of the Catalan government enters with some Catalan "mossos d'esquadra" police to arrest him for disrespect to the crown.
His majesty finds himself in a flap - shut up Joan he cries to the minister whislt struggling with the Mossos - the Spanish prosecutors are watching!

& indeed at times it seems the real power of oppression is not the Crown, nor the chuckling King with his jets, nor the congress of ZP, nor the opposition of the PP, nor the senate - no - by now anyone with even a passing interest in the ways of the Kastilian Empire or Spanish state know the real power lies with the prosecution & judges of Madrid.

The hot-headed Catalan lad who burnt his photo & didn't get away "Scot Free" received a 2 year sentance in a Spanish jail.

Minister Saura of course is a Greenie. His wife or long term partner of the civil union type is the number 2 of Barcelona's council which for a while now rules the city in minority since the ERC (catalan independence party of republicans) left the "tripartite". For in truth over the years the ERC have lost credibility with the Catalan independence supporters of the hills (& Girona) and the more radical "CUP" alliance of candidates are making inroads - if simply by dint of not accepting "estatuts", not turning blind eyes to King's visits, not enjoying photo-ops with the Dalai Lama & the usual stuff which many an Irish republican would understand.

Anyway - nobody has claimed responsibility for the bomb you know. But whatever way these roads to independence go, or to be fair - more Catalan spoken & the sniff of the rights & tax raising powers stil enjoyed by the Basques or Navarrans, or the pride of the Scottish!!!! I sincerely hope I never find my work researching Burmese companies is disturbed by those jets doing their real job.
There is war and there is occupation. There is resistance & there is liberty of expression. I'd rather burn the stock certificates of corporations.

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local reacion to the bomb in the Green's office in Spanish the language of the Kastillian empire & Mexico.
http://www.elperiodico.com/default.asp?idpublicacio_PK=...=1008
http://www.elperiodico.com/default.asp?idpublicacio_PK=...08&h=
http://www.jornada.unam.mx/ultimas/2007/09/30/desactiva...talan
http://www.elpais.com/articulo/espana/mossos/retiran/ar...7/Tes

original report of the 13th of Sept incident in Catalan with video to click on too!
http://www.vilaweb.cat/www/noticia?p_idcmp=2551440
English reports on the "300 years of oppression 300 years of resistance"
http://indymedia.ie/article/82114