Public prosecutors are seeking a 20-month ban and a fine of €30,000 (£25,000). If convicted, Torra could be barred from holding public office and handed a heavy fine. He refused to answer prosecutors’ questions, replying only to those of his lawyers. We’re talking about censorship and the violation of rights.” “I have many duties as president, and the first is the defence of rights and liberties, and I would never order the removal of a ribbon or a estelada flag.
“Yes, I disobeyed the central electoral board because it would have been impossible to obey an illegal order,” he told Catalonia’s high court of justice on Monday morning. But he argued that the orders were illegal and constituted an unacceptable act of censorship.
Torra said he had always known that his refusal to follow the board’s orders would result in him being put on trial. The board described the ribbons as “tools of political propaganda” that breached campaign laws. He was also told to take down the yellow ribbons used to express solidarity with jailed Catalan independence leaders. Torra admitted disobeying Spain’s central electoral board in March when it ordered him to remove a banner reading “Freedom for political prisoners and exiles” from the regional government headquarters in Barcelona. The sentences prompted huge marches and violent unrest on the streets of Barcelona. Tensions over the issue of Catalan independence re-erupted last month after Spain’s supreme court jailed nine separatist leaders for sedition for the parts they played in the failed push to secede two years ago. Catalonia’s separatist regional president, Quim Torra, has appeared in court in Barcelona accused of disobedience for failing to remove pro-independence symbols from public buildings during the campaign for April’s general election.