Catalonia's regional Parliament voted overwhelmingly Friday
in favor of independence from Spain, taking the country's political crisis into
uncharted territory.
The vote came as the Spanish Senate debated the Madrid
government's unprecedented plans to seize control of the autonomous region in a
bid to quash its independence bid.
Lawmakers voted in secret in the Catalan Parliament chamber
after a heated debate on a motion "to form the Catalan Republic as an
independent and sovereign state."
The outcome: 70 votes in favor, 10 against and two blanks.
Opposition parties walked out of the chamber ahead of the
vote.
The two parliamentary sessions were the culmination of a
weeks-long standoff, which began on October 1 when Catalonia defied Madrid and
held a banned referendum on independence, plunging Spain into its worst
political crisis since the restoration of democracy in the 1970s.
CNN
CNN
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