Former EP president: Catalan is not Kosovo

Catalans describing themselves as the silent “Most of them” rejected the region's independence, and the slogan filled Barcelona's streets on Sunday. Police say at least 350 thousand people attended the giant rally, whose organisers claim the number of participants was nearly one million.

Demonstrators gathered in “Uquinaona” Square, waving Spanish, Catalan and European Union flags while shouting: Hail Spain!

The event, with the motto “, is enough to go back to reason”, was organised by the Catalan Civic Association, which called on the region's residents to raise their voices as silent majority. Nobel laureate in Literature Mario Vargas Llosa, and former European Parliament President Josep Borrell Fontelles, a prominent Catalan socialist, addressed protesters at the end of the rally.

“Beyond past memories, sometimes magnificent and other tragic times, Spain is also a country of freedom, the country of rule of law and will not be destroyed by separatism”, Llosa said.

Borrell said Catalunja is not a state like Kosovo, where people's rights were systematically violated.

“Katalun is not like Lithuania, Kosovo or Algeria. It's not an occupied or militarized territory. The comparison has no place”, Josep Borrell said.

Spain has been mired in political crisis, since Catalan leaders made pledges to hold the independence referendum on October 1st, despite the decision of the country's Constitutional Court, which declared the vote illegal.