pendence. This has brought the Catalan government to organize the referendum against the will of the Spanish government, and over the last few weeks, the latter has shown its most oppressive face since Franco’s dictatorship.
As the UN has warned, the Spanish government has attempted to suppress the fundamental rights to freedom of expression, assembly and association and public participation. It did so by blocking 140 websites, arresting 14 high government officials, forbidding political meetings, threatening more than 700 mayors with civil prosecution (75 percent of Catalonia’s mayors) and sending 4,000 Spanish military police to search print houses and raid referendum material. If this wasn’t enough, the Spanish government has also intervened in Catalonia’s finances, leaving research centers, universities and other institutions without the ability to use their funds. In addition, the government has taken over the Catalan police (by putting in charge of it, ironically, a supporter of the failed coup d’etat of 1981). They are even considering arresting the current President of Catalonia Carles Puigdemont.
The Catalan people have proved for several years in a row on every 11th day of September (the National Day of Catalonia), that they know how to protest peacefully. That is the way they expect to be able to hold the referendum, and that’s the way they have been protesting against these repressive actions. In response, the Spanish government is accusing the organizers and thousands of protest attendees of sedition, a crime that could result in a maximum of 15 years in prison.
At this point, with the international press talking about a coup d’etat in Catalonia, it is clear that democracy is at stake, and for this reason, the Catalans’ right and desire to vote has received the support of many personalities. This includes six Nobel Prize winners, personalities like Joan Baez, Noam Chomsky and Yoko Ono, over 150 intellectuals from around the world (including UCR anthropology professor Susan Ossman) and freedom of expression supporters Edward Snowden and Julian Assange, the latter of whom is currently helping the Catalan government to protect their websites. Politicians from several countries, such as the UK, Norway and Denmark, have also shown their support, as did the former president of Slovenia (a country that used its right of self-determination in the past) and 48 EU parliamentarians.
This is not about whether the referendum is legal or not anymore, it’s about democracy. From here, as students and academics from the USA, I ask you to show your support to all the people in Catalonia who are peacefully fighting today for their rights. If we adopt a neutral position in front of these attacks on democracy, we become accomplices of the aggressor: The Spanish government. We cannot remain silent.