Catalonia deadlocked as nationalists plan new offensive

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Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy insists that a referendum on Catalonian independence is not going to be held. But that didn’t stop Artur Mas, president of the Catalan Government and head of centre-right party Convergence and Union (CiU), announcing an agreement with the leaders of the Republican Left of Catalonia (ERC), the Initiative for Catalonia Greens (IC-V) and the radical left-wing Popular Unity Candidates (CUP) concerning the date and the questions for a vote.

Mas announced that the voting would be held on 9 November 2014 and that the following questions would be posed to Catalans: “Do you want Catalonia to be a state?”, and for those respondents answering yes, “Do you want Catalonia to be an independent state?”