Spain’s foreign minister on Sunday stated that scenes of police violence against voters in the Catalonia independence referendum were “fake news”.

Videos and pictures of aggressive tactics by Spanish police filled social media feeds and were beamed round the world, and were condemned by politicians internationally.

However, speaking on The Andrew Marr Show on BBC One, Alfonso Dastis dismissed the images of Spanish brutality.

“Many of those pictures have proven to be fake pictures," he said.