"We can't condemn what doesn't exist." This was the response of Catalan president, Quim Torra, at an event that the political party JxCat held outside Lledoners prison on Sunday. "We are not violent. The Catalan independence movement has always condemned any type of violence," said Torra, who also accused the Spanish state of being the only participant in the political conflict which has used violence.

Torra's statements came in response to the demand made on Saturday by the acting Spanish prime minister, Pedro Sánchez, at a Socialist (PSOE) party meeting. Sánchez described Catalan independence as a "failed movement" and urged its organizations to condemn "any type of violence that comes from a small group within the independence movement."

In this context, the Catalan president accused the state of wanting to "divert public attention in the days before the Supreme Court verdict on the accused independence leaders arrives". The "diversion" he was referring to was last week's arrest of nine members of a pro-independence CDR activist group who have been accused of terrorism.

At the gathering outside Lledoners prison, the central Catalonia jail where most of the imprisoned independence leaders are held, Torra told the crowd that "JxCat will once again defend the independence of Catalonia and the Catalan Republic." "If we have to vote 'no' again to Pedro Sánchez, we will vote 'no' to Pedro Sánchez," he warned. JxCat, unlike its main rival pro-independence party, ERC, voted 'no' in the two Spanish parliamentary votes on the investiture of the Socialist candidate as the new Spanish prime minister.

Referring again to Sánchez's statements, Torra denied that independence had failed. "They say that independence has failed. It is prime minister Sánchez who has failed," he said. In the opinion of Torra, "the failure of Spanish politics" is because of its lack of any response to the Catalan situation. "You cannot rule without listening to the voice of Catalonia," he said.