CNN —The Spanish parliament has approved a controversial amnesty law Thursday that could benefit hundreds of people facing prosecution for their roles in the failed independence bid in Catalonia, in and around Barcelona, in 2017.
The vote for the bill, introduced last year by Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez’s ruling Socialist Party, was 177 to 172, the speaker of Spain’s lower house of parliament announced.
Crucial support came from two Catalan separatist parties, Junts (Together) and Esquerra Republicana (Republican Left), each with seven seats in Spanish parliament.
Spain’s main opposition conservative Popular Party and the far-right Vox party voted against the measure.
Just before the vote, the Madrid regional government president Isabel Diaz Ayuso, of the Popular Party, vowed to appeal against the new law to Spain’s Constitutional Court, the highest in the land.
Persons:
Pedro Sánchez’s, Esquerra Republicana, Isabel Diaz Ayuso
Organizations:
CNN, Socialist Party, Republican Left, Popular Party, Vox, Constitutional
Locations:
Catalonia, Barcelona, Spain’s, Madrid