The Catalan bipresidency is underway. The public appearance by Carles Puigdemont and Quim Torra in a Berlin hotel before the international media solemnifies the exceptional time Catalonia is living through. In a hotel because the building of the Catalan government's delegation in Berlin has been shuttered by the Spanish government, just like all the other Catalan diplomatic offices abroad, with the exception of the one in Brussels, which was kept open after article 155 despite its representative, Amadeu Atafaj, being fired. The legitimate president and the president-elect. The president to be reinstated and the one who has taken custody of the role to weather the problems posed by Spanish justice. This is the exact framing of the current political situation beyond the tweets and articles written in the past by Torra and for which he has already publicly apologised on four occasions.
Both Torra and Puigdemont used the powerful international platform of the press conference -as well as the Catalan and Spanish media there was the great majority of the German media, international news agencies and correspondents from other countries in Berlin- to pass the pressure for an immediate meeting with Mariano Rajoy in the Moncloa government palace to the Spanish government. For the president-elect, who still hasn't received congratulations for his nomination from Rajoy, as he himself explained to the international media, there could be an appointment in Madrid from Thursday onwards. The president of the European Commission, Jean-Claude Juncker, called for dialogue. After many months sticking to the official script that it was an internal matter for Spain, he's made this small admission. From now on, any delay is attributable to the PP government since Torra has set the clock ticking.
Beyond the fears of some and the concerns of others, the president-elect has no choice over the meeting. He has overcome the investiture with a manifesto and an explicit wish to comply with three key dates in the political commotion which Catalonia has experienced recently: 1st October (referendum), 27th October (proclamation of the Republic in the Parliament) and 21st December (election sending a pro-independence majority to the Parliament). It doesn't seem, as such, that with this statement of intentions, political prisoners in custody -which he calls "hostages"- and exiles in four European cities, dialogue to talk about everything can stop prioritising the pro-independence agenda. Rajoy, for good measure, opened himself to a meeting, "as with any president of an autonomous community".
But, without specifying anything more. It will be difficult for this meeting to take long in coming, when there are those around him who see it like entering into a wasp nest. And, all of this, with the legal news from European courts with respect to the extraditions which could come in the coming days. Very interesting.