Anger in Barcelona after Spanish police arrest Catalan minister and 12 officials in raids over referendum

Thousands of angry demonstrators burst onto the streets of Barcelona on Wednesday after Spanish police arrested 14 people in sweeping raids on Catalan government departments in a bid to halt the region's controversial referendum on independence.

Tensions flared between supporters of the referendum set for October 1 and police ordered to prevent the vote that has been suspended by Spain’s highest court.

At raided offices across the city, protesters shouted "Fascists!" and "Out, forces of occupation!" as members of the Civil Guard military police moved in in riot gear. 

Several high ranking government officials were detained, among them Josep Lluís Salvadó, the treasury secretary, and Josep Maria Jové, secretary general of the finance department and number two to the vice president, Oriel Junqueras.

Among 41 raids, police searched the Catalan government’s economy, foreign affairs, and labour and social affairs departments, as well as offices in the Presidency.

They also confiscated a haul of 9.6 million referendum ballot papers - believed to be the government's entire consignment.

Carlos Puigdemont, the Catalan president, accused the Spanish state of "authoritarian" behaviour and suspending Catalonia's autonomy by stealth.

“The Spanish state has effectively suspended our self-government and applied a de facto state of emergency," he said, after a crisis meeting.

Mr Puigdemont branded the crackdown a "coordinated aggression" by a state that had "crossed the red line that separated it from totalitarian regimes".

He insisted the vote would go ahead, even if it had to be carried out in an improvised manner. “On October 1 we will leave our homes, carrying a ballot paper and we will use them.”

Catalonia would never accept a "return to times past", he vowed - a reference to the Franco dictatorship, under which Catalan institutions and identity were brutally repressed. 

But Spain's prime minister, Mariano Rajoy, insisted that the Catalan government had forced the raids by violating the Spanish constitution and ignoring court warnings over a vote it did not have the legal power to call. 

“The state has to react. The referendum cannot take place because it would liquidate national sovereignty and the right of all Spaniards to decide what they want their country to be,” added Mr Rajoy.

The operation was heavily criticised by Pablo Iglesias, leader of the Left-wing party Podemos, who said it was "shameful" that Spain would have "political prisoners".

Even many opponents of independence have questioned Mr Rajoy's approach, arguing that his dogmatic stance is feeding the separatist movement. 

That dynamic was on full display on the streets of Barcelona, where incensed protesters accused Madrid of taking the country back to the days of dictatorship.

Outside the headquarters of the CUP, the junior Catalan coalition partner, where hundreds attempted to face down raiding police, one woman wept as she cried: "The dictatorship has returned! Franco lives again!"

Another, Maria Angels Marquez, a retired teacher, said she remembered the repression of the dictatorship years and that the crackdown "is making me relive things that I never thought would be again".

"How I would like to be Scottish!" she told The Telegraph, a reference to the 2014 independence referendum longingly admired by many Catalans.

Miquel Catasus, a bank worker in his fifties, called for the European Union to step in, telling the Telegraph that the Franco dictatorship "never died and has now come back to finish its work".

But Madrid and its supporters say it is the Catalan government which is behaving undemocratically. Earlier this month Catalonia’s parliament passed a law to enable a referendum after barely a few hours of heated debate.

The law does not make any provisions for a minimum turnout threshold for its result to be binding, and provisions have been made for Catalonia to declare independence within 48 hours of a yes vote.

With both sides refusing to give ground, how the referendum will play out remains unclear. 

“There are only two political proposals on offer today: one is that we all vote and the population expresses its points of view and respecting the side that wins; the other is state repression. There is nothing else,” Catalonia’s foreign affairs chief, Raül Romeva, told The Telegraph.

'Nazi' tactics 

Spain's Foreign Minister Alfonso Dastis has accused Catalan separatists of using "Nazi" tactics to intimidate their opponents before the referendum.

"Referendums are a weapon of choice of dictators," he added during an interview broadcast Tuesday with Bloomberg television in New York.

Pro-separatist parties captured 47.6 percent of the vote in a September 2015 regional election in Catalonia which was billed as a proxy vote on independence, giving them a narrow majority of 72 seats in the 135-seat Catalan parliament.

But opinion polls show that Catalonia's roughly 7.5 million residents are deeply divided on independence.

A survey commissioned by the regional government in July showed that 49.4 percent of Catalans were against independence while 41.1 percent were in favour.

But more than 70 percent of Catalans said they wanted a referendum on independence to settle the issue.

Catalonia, a wealthy region which accounts for about one-fifth of Spain's economic output, already has significant powers over matters such as education and healthcare.

But Spain's economic worries, coupled with a perception that Catalonia pays more in taxes than it receives in investments and transfers from Madrid, have helped push the cause of secession.