Peoples without Borders

BARCELONA/BERLIN (Own report) – Just days before regional elections in Spain’s Catalonia – elections declared a plebiscite on secession – a political partner of the German Green Party is calling for the rapid secession of that region from Spain. Ethnically defined “peoples” throughout Europe should have the “right to self-determination,” recognizing “no borders,” according to a declaration signed by the Spanish member organization of the “European Free Alliance” (EFA). The EFA unites separatist parties of various political orientations from numerous EU member countries. These include organizations closely connected to Viktor Orbán’s ruling Fidesz Party, in Hungary, conservative Flemish nationalists and a party in the tradition of northern Italian separatists, who, years ago, had used terrorism as a means of imposing South Tyrol’s absorption into Austria. Both, the EFA and the German Green Party are members of the same parliamentary caucus collective in the European Parliament. EFA subsidiaries disseminate a map of European so-called nations without states, depicting, for example, Catalonia as independent of Spain and merged with other territories in Spain and France to constitute a “Greater Catalonia.” Leading politicians in the current campaign for Catalonian separatism are propagating pan-Catalonian views, which opponents sharply criticize as “cultural racism with an expansionist demeanor.” The EFA’s map of Europe also depicts Germany merged with Austria and territories of neighboring countries to form a Greater Germany.