Tag Archives: spain

Ex-King Juan Carlos of Spain and his son, King Felipe VI

 

El rey esta muerto….

 

…larga vida al rey.

Lucha!!

Spain puzzles over ex-King Juan Carlos’s whereabouts (BBC)

Getty

44 degrees!

In a mask!

Any excuse.

Update:

Sizzle.

Meanwhile…

Ah here.

President of the European Council Charles Michel and EU Secretary General of the EU Council  Jeppe Tranholm-Mikkelsen during a video conference with EU leaders yesterday

This morning.

Via BBC:

For ordinary people, frightened for their health, the safety of their loved ones, worrying about their rent and feeding their family after businesses shut down, the idea that Europe’s leaders spent six hours on Thursday night, squabbling over the wording of their summit conclusions in order to defer a key decision over coronavirus funds, will be incomprehensible.

Spain and Italy – ravaged by the effects of the virus on their populations and their limited public finances – were deeply disappointed. Italy was already one of the EU’s most Eurosceptic member states before Covid-19 hit.

Italian Twitter was littered with expletives on Thursday – and those were just the posts from politicians.

Coronavirus: Can EU get a grip on crisis? (BBC)

Meanwhile…

Now, its economy is at an enforced standstill in an effort to break the back of the epidemic. But its troubles won’t end when the virus has run its course. Given the prominence of tourism in the Italian economy (13 percent of Italy’s GDP versus 8.6 percent of Germany’s), the country faces a much harder long-term headwind to return to prosperity than many other EU states.

These would be daunting problems for a country with sovereign control of its currency. But Italy, as a Eurozone member, does not have any such control.

The Italian state cannot print money to sustain its citizenry while the economy is in lockdown. It has to beg Brussels for permission to spend — and Europe’s finance ministers are bickering about the terms under which such spending would be permitted in much the same manner that America’s senators have been.

Will the EU survive coronavirus? (The Week)

Pic via EU

Swoon.

Is that a testing kit or are you just glad to see me?

*hot sweats*

Earlier: No Walk In The Park

 

 

Hueston Station, Dublin this morning

This morning.

Minister for Health Simon Harris spoke to Bryan Dobson  on RTÉ Radio One’s Morning Ireland.

It followed a decision of the National Health Emergency Team last night, that people returning from Spain and Italy will be given leaflets at Irish airports in which they’ll be encouraged to restrict their movements for the next two weeks, specifically to not go to work and to lessen their social contacts.

In regards to people returning from Cheltenham, Mr Harris said they will get information about symptoms.

The Health Minister also said:

“We’re more likely to get this virus in our home from bad practice in terms of hand hygiene and the like, so do please follow the health advice. You have a really important role to play.”

Of the closures announced yesterday, he said:

“They’re in place now until the 29th of March, they’ll be reviewed right through the process and reviewed again on the 29th of March. If they need to be extended they will be but we need see. We’ve taken some very, very significant measures that are asking people in our country to alter their behaviour quite significantly for the next fortnight. We’ll only obviously continue those measures if it’s absolutely necessary and if they’re proving to have a benefit.

“So at this stage it’s too early to say [if they closures be extended for a longer period of time].”

“….It is an absolutely reality that this is something that could be with us for many, many months and we have to be conscious when we’re taking those measures as well, that measures we take have to be sustainable. We have to try to keep our country going, not to put our country into lockdown, we need people to go to work today and we need people to bake the bread and supply our supermarkets and we need our healthcare professionals to get to work.

“And we need to look after each other as well. So all of the measures we’re taking have to be seen through that prism.

“This is not a storm that goes away after a couple of days. This is asking people to alter our behaviour and change our lives for quite a period of time ahead.”

He also said:

“We have a suite of measures but we have to implement them at the right time and I think what we’ve now shown is a willingness to do that, to listen and to act quickly and decisively and we’ll continue to do that.

“Obviously all of the measures that have been put in place could be scaled up, if the need arose so we have banned gatherings indoors of 100 people, outdoors of 500 people, there’s obviously potential to do that,

“But what we won’t be doing is kind of strongman, macho politics movements where you’re looking like you’re doing something for he sake of doing something. We’ll be following the science here, we’ll be following the doctors’ advice, we’ll be listening to the chief medical officer and we’ll be acting.”

“…It’s very much a marathon not a sprint. Our country is not in lockdown. This is still, the same great country it was yesterday. We’re just asking everybody to live their lives a little bit differently so that we can try and make a real national collective effort.”

Listen back in full here

This afternoon.

The Socialist Party (PSOE) of caretaker Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez won the highest number of seats but fell short of an absolute majority at the repeat general election in Spain on Sunday.

With around 99% of the vote counted, the PSOE had taken 120 seats – three fewer than the result it managed at the April 28 general election. The conservative Popular Party (PP) won 87 seats – a major gain from the 66 seats it secured in April, its worst result ever.

But far-right group Vox saw the most significant rise, jumping from 24 to 52 seats, to become the third-largest party in Spain’s lower house, the Congress of Deputies.

Socialists win repeat Spanish election, Vox becomes third-biggest force in Congress (El Pais)

Meanwhile…

Across Europe and beyond, as an increasingly fragmented political landscape becomes more polarised and voters increasingly see issues of identity, not the economy, as the key battleground, countries are finding elections no longer have clear outcomes.

Sometimes, this can mean no government can be formed at all: Spain has been ruled by Sánchez’s caretaker administration since April and that looks likely to continue for some time. Another example is Israel, where elections in September failed to resolve the deadlock left by equally inconclusive polls in April.

Other times, coalitions can be built, but only after increasingly difficult negotiations: the Netherlands (208 days) and Sweden (more than four months) set new records in 2017 and 2018. Belgium has now been 170 days without a government, though that is still some way off its 541-day record after the 2010 elections.

Why is this happening?

In part because, from Germany to France, Italy to Austria and Spain to Sweden to Israel, fewer and fewer people are voting for the big, broad-church centre-right and centre-left parties that have dominated their respective national political stages since the end of the second world war.

Spain’s PP and PSOE would once garner 80% of the vote between them; they managed barely 48% on Sunday. In the Netherlands, the three big mainstream parties scraped barely 40% together at the previous general election – roughly the proportion that any one of them might previously have expected.

Spain stalemate shows inconclusive elections are the new normal (The Guardian)

Graphic: The Guardian

Barcelona, Spain this morning

This morning.

Barcelona, Spain.

Via Reuters:

Hundreds of thousands of demonstrators waving pro-independence flags and chanting “freedom for political prisoners” joined marches across Catalonia on Friday, the fifth day of protests against the jailing of nine separatist leaders over a failed bid to break away from Spain in 2017.

Friday’s marchers, ranging from families pushing prams to cyclists wheeling their bicycles, took over a highway lane and other major roads as they walked peacefully towards the Catalan capital, many sporting yellow ribbons – a sign of protest against the jailing of Catalan independence leaders.

Major roads were blocked off across Catalonia and several main streets in Barcelona were closed to traffic in anticipation of the marches, as well as picket lines that had begun springing up, while regional trains and the city’s metro were running on a reduced timetable after pro-independence unions called a strike…

More as we get it.

Thousands converge on Barcelona for fifth day of Catalan protests (Reuters)

El Clasico: Barcelona v Real Madrid postponed because of fears over civil unrest (BBC)

This week: ‘Sedicion’

Pic: Reuters

Women hold a Catalan pro-independence “Estelada” flag in Barcelona this morning Spain’s Supreme Court sentenced nine Catalan leaders to prison terms ranging from nine to 13 years for sedition and misuse of public funds for their role in a failed 2017 independence bid.

This morning.

Protests were immediately staged across Catalonia as Spain’s Supreme Court sentenced nine Catalan leaders to prison terms of between nine and 13 years for sedition for their role in a failed independence bid in 2017.

The long-awaited verdicts were less than those demanded by the prosecutionwhich had sought up to 25 years behind bars for former Catalan Vice President Oriol Junqueras on grounds of rebellion.

Catalonia leaders jailed for sedition by Spanish court (BBC)

‘An outrage’: Catalonia and the world reacts as separatist leaders handed jail terms (The Local.es)

Pic: AFP