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Freedom is "an electrical idea", which infused the Catalan referendum on 1st October last year, and must be "pursued again, seeing it through to the end and with all its consequences". This was the comment made by Catalan president Quim Torra in the event held this Sunday at the Generalitat palace in support of those people affected by last year's 1st October referendum on independence. "That 1st October marks out a milestone for a new moment, a new 1st October, in which we will have to do exactly the same as what we did", he said.

"We will have to do exactly the same, a chain of trust, with a non-violent spirit, to commit everything to democracy and, especially, to be capable, having lost our fear, to take the step that we took, an act of civil disobedience of a type which few have carried out in the recent history of Europe; this is that we have ahead of us and we have to do it", the president explained.

"We need everyone"

However, Torra warned that to make this possible it is necessary to maintain unity and not to be beaten by fear. "We need everybody in order to return to that point, to consolidate this victory; without that, none of what we have done until now would make any sense, if we were now to let fear conquer us and not return to the spirit of the 1st October to go where we have to go, that is, to build the Catalan Republic."

The president started his speech with a reference to the political prisoners and exiles. "We will not stop until they are released and back home, and this ribbon will be here until they are free", he said, referring to the yellow bow that presides over the Generalitat's Orange Tree Courtyard, where the event was held.

He made a special reference to civil groups Òmnium Cultural and Catalan National Assembly and to their imprisoned leaders, Jordi Cuixart and Jordi Sànchez. "They are in prison and in a way they have us imprisoned with them. They have to know that we are with them because they represent part of what the spirit of 1st October represents", he asserted.

The best of the Catalans

Overall, he said, the political and social leaders of the independence movement were the "tip of the lance", but the lance itself was the people, "the people of Catalonia". "Nobody must ever take 1st October away from you, because it represents the best that we Catalans have been able to build in many years", he summed up.

Torra described 1st October as "an electrical moment, one of solidarity and fraternity, which went beyond supporters of independence and engaged society in general, because what was at stake was democracy, the freedom of expression and the freedom of thought."

The speech, which was brief, also included a reference to the referendum trial, which he asserted will be "unjust, a general trial of the independence movement, a farce that has been constructed based on an immense falsehood." "Voting is not a crime, the crime is that they beat you for going to vote, and some day those who gave the orders to beat, to seek retribution, will be judged by international courts", he stated. 

For Torra, 1st October was a day of victory, and "also a day when we, the Catalans, became fearless". For this reason, and after quoting words from Catalan cellist Pau Casals, "the earth turns into heaven when you lose your fear, don't be afraid to be men", he went to say that "a man or a woman, if they are not free, are not anything".

Collective intelligence

The first to speak at the gathering had been Catalan vice president Pere Aragonès, who stressed that the 1st October referendum was possible thanks to the fact that the independence movement acted with "unity, determination and collective intelligence". "We have done it and are capable of doing it again", he said.

The act in the Orange Tree Courtyard took place before an audience of over a hundred, including  some of those who were injured or affected by the 1st October and international observers. Tricia Marwick, former speaker of the Scottish Parliament and an international observer at the referendum, spoke on behalf of the observers. "1st October was a victory for democracy and for the Catalan people, in the face of fear and intimidation," she said.

The audience also heard words from Jaume Casamitjana, one of the many people assaulted by police that day, as well as from Eloi Hernàndez, mayor of the town of Fonollosa. "That day we planted one further seed, which undoubtedly will be the seed of victory", the Fonollosa mayor affirmed, explaining how the Civil Guard forced entered his town's voting station on referendum day, while Casamitjana highlighted the bonds that were formed in society on 1st October.