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Catalan vice president Pere Aragonès has asked the Spanish government to "keep watch over its people in uniform" who "pursue" Catalan independence symbols, in a reference to the Civil Guard officer identified as a member of an organised squad dedicated to removing yellow ribbons (symbol of solidarity with the rights of the imprisoned Catalan politicians) and pro-independence estelada flags. Aragonès also accused the political party Ciutadados (Cs) of encouraging "the repression of freedom of expression" through its campaigns against the use of these symbols in public places.

Aragonès was speaking in Barcelona's Gràcia district at the event "Republic is liberty", held by his party, the Republican Left (ERC). The party's Barcelona municipal spokesperson, Jordi Coronas, and its Gràcia councillor, Alba Metge, also took part.

"We ask the central government to keep watch over its uniformed officers, to control its people, those who dedicate themselves to persecuting freedom of expression", complained Aragonès. He asked Pedro Sánchez's Spanish government to "act and restore order" to stop those who "are dedicating themselves to removing elements from public places". "We've had enough of impunity for attacks against the freedom of expression", declared the Catalan vice president.

Aragonès also affirmed that the "attacks" on the freedom of expression not only come from "the security forces of the state", but also from political parties like Cs, to whom he directed some harsh criticisms.

According to Aragonès, Cs is urging Catalans "to repress freedom of expression" with its campaigns against the presence of pro-independence symbols in public spaces, and for this reason he asked the leaders of the Ciudadanos party to call a halt to these initiatives and to speak up themselves about the "attacks that people in our country have been subject to because they were defending their ideas".

He warned that with these campaigns Cs is "trying to provoke" exactly the thing that the party is ostensibly complaining about: a "social fracture".

"We won't let them that create a social fracture", added Aragonès.

The Catalan vice president stated that public space "cannot be neutral" in the face of the "injustice and lack of freedom of expression", in allusion to the independence process and the Catalan leaders in prison or exile, to whom he had dedicated the opening words of his address.

"We can't go back to the time when politics stayed at home", he argued, "because the streets belong to all of us."