BARCELONA/MADRID Dec 23 (TNS): Separatists looked set to regain power in Catalonia after voters rejected Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy’s attempt to neuter its independence movement, instead re-igniting the country’s biggest political crisis in decades.
Spanish markets recoiled at a surprise result that is also a setback for the European Union, which must now brace for more secessionist noise as it grapples with the disruption of Brexit and simmering east European discontent.
By risking a parliamentary election in the region, Rajoy appears to have made the same mistake that leaders including Greece’s Alexis Tsipras, Britain’s David Cameron and Italy’s Matteo Renzi have made in recent years: betting that voters would resolve their troublesome domestic conundrums for them.
Spain’s stock market fell around 1 percent and the country’s borrowing costs rose as investors bet the ensuing ramp-up in tensions with its richest region will hurt the euro zone’s fourth-largest economy.
Rajoy ruled out calling national elections over events that have weakened his authority, while both he and exiled separatist leader Carles Puigdemont said they were open for dialogue.
But they offered no details and such calls in the past have failed to yield any solution.
After several strained months that saw secessionists organize an illegal referendum on Oct. 1, and police confiscate urns to try to prevent it from taking place, the election result has done nothing to resolve the standoff either.
The secessionists kept a majority, but it was reduced and they may have difficulty forming a government; and support for unionist party Ciudadanos has surged, but not enough to catapult them into power.
