Catalonia votes as coronavirus concerns look set to dampen independence push

The far right could make gains in a vote likely to stall separatist ambitions and watched with keen interest across Europe, reports Graham Keeley in Madrid

Salvador Illa, Catalonia’s Socialist Party candidate (Socialist Party of Catalonia (PS)

Voters in Spain’s politically volatile Catalonia go to the polls on Sunday in the first regional election since 2017 when a failed independence bid threatened to tear the country apart.

Three years after an unconstitutional referendum and the unilateral declaration of independence that led to long jail terms for nine Catalan political leaders, separatists hope the result will revive their cause and allow them to claim more than 50 per cent of the vote for the first time.

And in the midst of the Covid-19 pandemic, Spain’s Socialist prime minister Pedro Sanchéz has gambled by pitching his health minister as a candidate to try to oust pro-independence parties who have held power for a decade in the wealthy region.