Catalan declaration of independence
On 27 October 2017, a resolution based on the "Declaration of the representatives of Catalonia" declaring the independence of Catalonia was voted in the Parliament and was approved with 70 votes in favor, 10 against, and 2 blank votes. Fifty-three MPs from the opposition refused to be present during the voting after the legal services of the Catalan Parliament advised that the voting could not take place, as the law on which it was based had been suspended by the Spanish Constitutional Court. The two pro-independence parties, JxSí and CUP, had 72 seats, and the vote in favour of independence obtained 70.
Reactions to the Catalan independence referendum, 2017
Catalonian President Carles Puigdemont said he will keep his pledge to declare independence unilaterally. He added that Catalonia "has won the right to become an independent state." He further blamed the situation in Catalonia on the "intransigence, the repression, the complete denial of reality, the hostility seen during the democratic demands made by our country" and that "on this day of hope and suffering, Catalonia’s citizens have earned the right to have an independent state in the form of a republic ... We have earned the right to be listened to, respected and recognised."