Spain’s Socialists have reached a deal with Catalan separatist Junts party for government support, Spanish television TVE reported on Thursday.
Barcelona-based La Vanguardia newspaper also reported the Socialists and Junts had reached a deal. The two parties have not yet confirmed any agreement.
Spain’s acting Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez and his Socialist Party (PSOE) are trying to form a government after a July election produced no outright winner.
He reached a deal to govern in coalition with the hard left Sumar platform last month but also needs several other smaller parties – who have supported him in the past – to back him in an investiture vote that could take place as soon as next week.
Junts has said during negotiations that it would give its seven votes in parliament in exchange for an amnesty law that could exculpate as many as 1,400 activists and politicians involved in a failed attempt to separate Catalonia from the rest of Spain that reached a head in 2017.
The PSOE on Nov. 2 also signed a deal with another Catalan pro-independence party, Esquerra Republicana de Catalunya (ERC).
The potential amnesty has met fierce condemnation from Sanchez’s conservative opponents who have organised large protests and accused him of putting the rule of law in Spain on the line for his own political gain.
(Reuters)