Quim Torra, former president of the Catalan Generalitat, has raised unease and indignation in Aragon by proposing that the border of Catalonia should be placed beyond its current limits and annex the so-called Aragonese, Catalan-speaking Strip, which includes several regions of the three provinces.
Political leaders and mayors have stood up to the claims of “radical and squatter independence”, which, in their opinion, makes “an interested interpretation of history”, something they consider “intolerable” and “lack of respect”.
The president of Aragón, Jorge Azcón, has described Torra’s statements as “detestable distortions of history and imperialist delusions of the most radical independence movement.”
He added that “they will always have us in front of them, defending coexistence between Autonomous Communities from respect and equality, within the constitutional framework.”
In a writing published on his social networks, Torra says that “there is documentary evidence of the limit of Catalonia located on the Cinca River.”
He cites the Huesca town of Fraga, “the capital of the Baix Cinca”, where, as he assures, neither there “nor in any of the towns in the regions of the Strip is there much awareness of its history.”
In his opinion, it is a story that “has been a component that has been used since Aragon to empty our regions of Catalanness by fattening them with an Aragonism that is often folkloric and always anti-Catalan.”
He adds that “the indeterminacy of the limits of Catalonia and Aragon is one of the great errors in the History of Catalonia.”
The former president of the Generalitat believes that “the evidence of the Catalanness that the language represents and the reality of the socioeconomic and religious relations with the Principality over time, Lleida in the case of Baix Cinca and la Litera, and Tortosa for the Matarraña, they should have shifted our regions towards the natural side of Catalonia”.
He regrets that, “on the other hand, against so much evidence we find the stubborn, and most irrational, reality of lands that live with their backs to Catalonia and embrace the most primary and exclusive Aragonism and Spanishism.”
Torra takes advantage of the occasion to remember the, in his opinion, “abominable episode of the looting of works of art from the parishes of La Franja and the monastery of Sijena” which, by court order, had to return to Aragon from the Catalan museums where they were.
Several mayors of municipalities in the eastern strip of Aragon, in the regions of La Litera, Cinca Medio and Bajo Cinca, have denounced this Tuesday, along the Cinca River, Torra’s “radical and squatting independence movement.”
The president of the Huesca Provincial Council and mayor of Monzón, Isaac Claver (PP), has expressed his rejection of the expansionist desire of the former Junts leader.
He appeared alongside the municipal officials of Binéfar, Patricia Rivera; from Tamarite, Sandra González; and from Fraga, Ignacio Gramún, to express their “fatigue” with the territorial claims of Catalan ultranationalism.
Claver has regretted Torra’s “self-interested historical interpretation” and recalled that “this is not the first time that the independence movement has wanted to appropriate territories in the province of Huesca, disrespecting and ignoring our Alto Aragonese and Spanish identity and sentiment.” .
He has asked the Huesca socialists, who have supported the amnesty for those convicted and prosecuted in the process in their national committee, to publicly condemn Torra’s words.
Claver has announced the presentation at the next plenary session of the Provincial Council of a motion “to give an opportunity to the 12 provincial deputies of the PSOE to condemn the words of Puigdemont’s successor.”
Likewise, he has warned that if Pedro Sánchez forms a government together with Sumar and with the support of the secessionist parties, “we will repeatedly witness this type of declarations not exempt from political intentions.”
He has warned that, “although the words of Puigdemont’s successor may seem like an occurrence or a delirium, they could become a new demand for the formation of the new Government of Spain.”
For his part, the first vice president of the Government of Aragon, Alejandro Nolasco (Vox), has described Torra’s claims as “intolerable”, and has accused the current Catalan president, Pere Aragonés, of “complicit silence”, since, in his opinion, “silence gives consent”.
Nolasco, who is also Minister of Territorial Development, Depopulation and Justice, made these statements in the Cortes of Aragon where he announced that a new study will be carried out “to delimit to the millimeter” the geographical limits of the Autonomous Community.
At the same time, he pointed out that Aragon will be “a containment dam against this pan-Catalan expansionism.”
For his part, Alberto Izquierdo, general secretary of the PAR, has also echoed Torra’s claims on his social networks and has indicated that “claiming what was the origin of the Kingdom of Aragon is a sign of audacity and ignorance. Aragon always has claimed what is his for justice and for his history.