Live News From Spain As It Happens

Formentera has achieved a miracle by eliminating Athletic Club of Bilbao, in their home stadium of San Mamés. Up until the last play, the match was drawn, with Athletic Club holding their advantage from the 1-1 draw in the first leg, but a corner kick by Omar Álvarez set up Álvaro Muñiz for a perfect header in the 96th minute snatching the win for Formentera and knocking Athletic out of the competition altogether.

It was a fairytale ending for the Segunda B outfit (Spain’s 3rd division) and a fair reward for a very modest team which was able to battle it out against an experienced first division team with 23 King’s Cup titles already under their belt. Formentera, who entered the Kings Cup for the first time 3 years ago were ecstatic with the result. Muniz, the goal scorer said, “ This is the best day of my career, you can’t imagine how happy I am right now!”

Read more at thinkSPAIN.com

A total of thirty-seven people have been injured, two of them seriously, as a result of a train derailing on the line between Seville and Malaga. The accident, according to the first hypothesis, was due to water infiltration around the tracks, a consequence of the recent heavy rainfall.

The train, which was carrying 79 passengers at the time, derailed at 10.15am between Utrera and Marchena, close to Arahal in the province of Seville.

The emergency services had to use tractors, quad bikes and army vehicles to reach the accident zone as heavy rainfall the previous night had flooded the surrounding fields and rendered the access roads virtually unpassable. Many of the emergency personnel trekked 3km across the fields rather than wait for alternative vehicles.

Read more at thinkSPAIN.com

IF BRITAIN wants to make a success of 'trading with the world' post-Brexit, it needs to work on its language skills – starting with Spanish, a recent study argues.

The British Council, which works with foreign exchange students in the UK and British students abroad, as well as culture and education in general, says if the world is going to be the country's future oyster, it will need more and more professionals fluent in a language other than English.

Spanish, Chinese, French, Arabic and German are recommended in that order.

The UK will also have to work hard on reinforcing its bilateral relationships with individual EU member States, since they are closer geographically and will still be important for trade, the British Council says.

“A global Britain means being multi-lingual is going to become essential, although the current linguistic reality in the UK is very different,” says the report.

“We have to get out of the mantra that 'English is the international language for business' and start to understand the importance of learning other languages, and of the various circumstances in which they are being used either concurrently with, or at the cost of, English.

Read more at thinkSPAIN.com

A SPECIES of cat living wild in Madrid over 10,000 years ago has been discovered in an archaeological dig in Madrid.

The Leptofelis Vallesiensis, as the excavation team have baptised it, would have lived fairly close to humans at around the time cats as we know them today are thought to have 'domesticated themselves' to make sure they always had a source of food.

They largely resembled the mountain cat (pictured) which still lives wild in parts of Spain today.

The National Museum of Natural Sciences (MNCN), in conjunction with the High Council of Scientific Research (CSIC) and Madrid's Alcalá University (UAH) made the discovery at the Cerro de los Batallones archaeological site in Torrejón de Velasco, near the capital, where it was recently reported that fossils from the earliest and short-necked species of giraffe had been found.

According to the historians, the 10,000-year-old cat would have been slim and lithe, but weighing between seven and nine kilos – compared with a typical, normal-weight domestic cat's 4.5 to five kilos – meaning they are likely to have been longer and taller than the four-legged friends who occupy an estimated 30% of human homes in the western world.

Read more at thinkSPAIN.com

The leader of the PSOE, Pedro Sánchez, has today appealed to the prime minister, Mariano Rajoy, to "clear up the doubts" that he has generated with regard to the promise he made to ensure that that the topic of constitutional reform would be broached within six months and demanded that he "keep his word".

"Mr Rajoy, I am addressing you personally," he said, "as you promised me personally that you would open the way to constitutional reform within six months".

Read more at thinkSPAIN.com

CHRISTMAS lights have already been switched on in all bar a few of Spain's main cities a month ahead of the date, costing millions of euros.

But this huge spending is in fact an investment, since the bright, festive appearance of the city centres encourages people to visit and shop for Christmas.

Practically all of them use LED bulbs to save energy costs and help the environment.

Madrid's lights went on last night (Friday) and the city will remain illuminated for 256 hours, until January 8 inclusive, at a cost of €2.4 million.

Málaga also switched its lights on last night, and will spend 18% more than last year - €976,000 – although this includes the famous and spectacular Light and Sound Show on the C/ Larios, now a nationwide tourist attraction.

Barcelona's lights were switched on along the Ramblas, the city's main pedestrianised and most-touristy street, in a ceremony which paid tribute to the victims of the August 17 terrorist attacks.

Read more at thinkSPAIN.com

SPAIN'S president Mariano Rajoy will meet with British prime minister Theresa May in London on Tuesday, December 5, national government spokesman Íñigo Méndez de Vigo has just confirmed.

As well as discussing bilateral relations between the UK and Spain, they will also review the progress made in Brexit talks with the EU.

The day before, however – on Monday, December 4 – Spain's deputy president Soraya Sáenz de Santamaría will meet with the EU's Brexit negotiator Michel Barnier to discuss the same.

Sra Sáenz de Santamaría heads up the inter-ministerial commission for monitoring Brexit.

In 10 days' time, Mrs May's ultimatum given by the EU to clarify her proposals for Brexit will be up, and so far, M. Barnier and the president of the Union, Donald Tusk, have said progress made is 'insufficient'.

Today (Friday), after Tusk's and May's second face-to-face meeting in less than a week – firstly in Göteburg, Sweden and today in Brussels – sources from within the EU say there is nothing new to report, except that Tusk 'has not closed the door' on a deal, creating a ray of optimism on both sides.

Tusk says he believes 'making sufficient progress' by the Council of Europe Summit in December is 'still possible', but remains 'an enormous challenge'.

“December 4 is the absolute deadline for London to make some extra effort,” EU sources say.

The Summit will be over December 14 and 15, and the remaining EU-27 will be expected to confirm whether they consider enough progress in negotiations has been made on the three most crucial points – the border between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland, the sum the UK has to pay to meet its contractual liabilities with Europe, and the fate of the four million or so EU and British citizens living in the UK and Europe respectively.

Tusk says unless firm decisions have been made on these points by December 4, he will not present his planned draft agreement about trade relations and any possible transition period.

Already this week, the UK has lost the European Medicines Agency (EMA) and European Banking Authority (EBA) to Amsterdam and Paris respectively – the former being the subject of a bid by Barcelona.

As well as Donald Tusk, Theresa May has held one-to-one meetings with Belgian prime minister Charles Michel, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Danish premier Lars Lokke, which she says were 'very positive'.

Read more at thinkSPAIN.com

ONE of Catalunya's pro-independence politicians has complained there is no heating in Spain's prison cells.

Jordi Sànchez, number two on the list for the party Junts per Catalunya – headed up by now-ex president Carles Puigdemont - and leader of the Catalunya National Assembly (ANC), says: “The nights are starting to get really cold in here.”

“There's only heating in the family and lawyers' visiting area, but none in the cells,” he complains.

Although Sànchez does concede that he gets 'plenty of warmth' in the shape of 'letters of support'.

“You can't keep a country down,” he insisted in an interview with regional newspaper Ara.

“There's no way of holding back a nation's wishes.

“The independence movement's democratic aspirations will find new ways to keep forging ahead.”

Read more at thinkSPAIN.com

A MOTHER who killed her daughter's rapist in a fit of rage in a high-profile case in the province of Alicante is now allowed to go home during the day and spend nights in prison only.

María del Carmen García's daughter Verónica was just 13 when Antonio Cosme raped her at knifepoint in October 1998, plunging the mother into a deep depression – and, when Cosme was on prison leave seven years later and attempted to provoke her, the distressed mum saw red.

Cosme, who showed no remorse whatsoever, asked María del Carmen 'how her daughter was' when he was hanging around a bus station near the family home in Benejúzar – a town he lived nowhere near, had no connections with, and was not apparently catching a bus at all.

He then went into the family's local bar, which they visited almost daily.

María del Carmen, in a combination of rage, fear and hysteria, went to the nearest petrol station, bought a vat of fuel and returned to the bar, poured the contents over her daughter's rapist and set him alight.

He suffered 90% burns and died in hospital within days.

Read more at thinkSPAIN.com

MOBILE phone use costs could come down by up to 40% within the next two years, if the National Markets and Competition Commission (CNMC) goes ahead with its current recommendations.

Calls would cost as little as 0.64 cents per minute by the year 2020 in accordance with the European Commission's requests.

The CNMC has been analysing call costs among all operators after receiving a letter from the European Commission giving it two months to do so.

The aim is to reduce end call costs by 40% - the tariff charged by network operators to virtual mobile operators, those which do not have their own network, which will reduce the final cost to the customer.

According to the CNMC, virtual operators will cut their own costs by call tariffs being reduced, because they have to pay main operators for use of the netork.

Read more at thinkSPAIN.com

VALENCIA has just spent €2 million on clearing a 'wipe-berg' – the city's own version of the UK's 'fatbergs' – from its drainage system and has launched a campaign urging residents not to put anything other than toilet paper down the lavatory.

Recent reports in the Spanish media showed that a kilometre-long blockage had appeared in Valencia's pipes, mostly made up of wet-wipes – the type used instead of toilet paper mainly, but also face-wipes and baby-wipes – plus other waste items that should not be flushed away, including cotton wool, cotton buds, dental floss, sanitary towels, tampons, and even condoms.

It came at around the same time as Thames Water in London reported a 'fatberg the size of a Boeing 747' having been found in the drainage system under Whitechapel, weighing 140 tonnes and measuring 250 metres, costing around €1.15m to shift with workers on the job seven days a week for – so far – two months.

The expression 'fatberg', first coined in 2013 and added to the Oxford English Dictionary (OED) in 2015, describes a huge, congealed deposit found in the pipes made up of similar items as those recently removed from Valencia's waterworks, but also greasy and fatty matter such as used cooking oil and food fat, and even used nappies, tennis balls and chunks of wood.

Read more at thinkSPAIN.com

A TAXI strike lasting 24 hours has been planned across Spain for next Wednesday (November 29) after a meeting between trade bosses and the ministry of public works failed to bring agreements over regulating car-pooling companies.

The cabbies' federation, Fedetaxi, had called for an urgent meeting with the Secretary of State for Infrastructure, Transport and Housing, Julio Gómez-Pomar, after a Supreme Court verdict ordered the ministry to grant 80 permits to firms which offer hired cars with drivers.

Read more at thinkSPAIN.com

BARCELONA has fallen at the first hurdle in its quest to host the European Medicines Agency (EMA) once it leaves London at the end of March 2019 due to Brexit.

European Union leaders voted this afternoon (Monday) on which of the candidate cities would become the new venue, with up to three rounds of votes permitted if a clear winner did not emerge immediately.

Read more at thinkSPAIN.com

A GALICIA court says Spain could be eligible for over €1.57 billion in compensation for the Prestige disaster in 2002, when the ship of the same name sank in the Bay of Biscay and its 77,000-tonne cargo of fuel caused an oil slick large enough to reach from Barcelona nearly to the Scottish border.

Of this, more than 10%, or €1.8 million, would be destined for the regional government of Galicia for its costs in clearing and recycling the spilt fuel, says the court in A Coruña which handled the Prestige case in 2013.

A further €61m would be payable to the State of France.

Jointly and severally liable are the ship's captain, Apostolos Ioannis Mangouras, The London Steamship Owners' Mutual Insurance Association, and the ship's owner, Mare Shipping Inc.

Mangouras and the insurance company have to pay up to at least US$1bn (€850m).

The captain would have been insured for public liability as part of his profession, as would Mare Shipping.

Insurance companies involved would be able to reclaim some or all of the money from the International Oil Pollution Compensation Funds (IOPC Funds), up to the limits the organisation imposes.

Third-most costly environmental disaster after Columbia and Chernobyl

The oil tanker capsized 15 years ago on November 13 during a storm about 250 kilometres off the stretch of shoreline known as the Costa de la Muerte – eerily, 'Death Coast' – in the north-western region of Galicia.

IF IT DOES not rain in Spain in the next few days, this November will go down on record as being the driest in 36 years, warns the State meteorological agency, AEMET.

And this is likely to spell impending disaster for water supplies – although agricultural minister Isabel Tejerina has assured on-tap water across the country is guaranteed until at least the end of the year, reservoirs are currently at an historic low of 37% - the worst in 22 years.

Autumn usually brings monsoons to the Mediterranean lasting several days, and between October and December, heavy rain is a regular feature, but the last four or five years have seen the rain dry up with few downpours and showers only appearing briefly every couple of months.

Parts of the Mediterranean and south coast have had serious trouble providing on-tap water in summer over the last two years, with record numbers of tourists and historically-low rainfall – only coastal towns with desalination plants to extract salt from sea water have had no problems in meeting demand.

Although temperatures have dropped considerably since the start of November, they are expected to rise next week – reaching as much as 23ºC to 25ºC for a few hours a day in some parts of the mainland - and AEMET predicts that the current anti-cyclone, with warm midday climates and chilly nights, will continue for the foreseeable future.

Read more at thinkSPAIN.com

AIR-POLLUTION caused by traffic and industry is as harmful to the health of people who live amongst it than smoking cigarettes, according to the Spanish Pneumology and Chest Surgery Society (SEPAR).

“Smoking is the third cause of death in the world, and air-pollution is the fourth; they go hand in hand,” says SEPAR environmental risks coordinator Dr Isabel Urrutia.

“If someone lives with air-pollution, the danger to their health is the same as if they smoked.”

Hospital visits and GP appointments tend to rise on days when smog levels are high, particularly among those with pre-existing respiratory conditions such as asthma and Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD), known colloquially as 'being broken-winded'.

For people who do not suffer any known condition, high levels of air-pollution in their immediate environment can have serious long-term consequences – in fact, it is one explanation for the increasingly-high number of cases of lung cancer diagnosed in non-smokers who are not exposed to passive smoking.

Read more at thinkSPAIN.com

MAYOR of Caracas and opponent of Venezuela's régime Antonio Ledezma has fled to Spain and met with the latter's president Mariano Rajoy following more than two years of house arrest in the South American country.

“We need to rescue democracy in Venezuela as soon as possible, we cannot let Venezuela slip away from us,” Ledezma said when he arrived at Madrid's Adolfo Suárez-Barajas airport today (Saturday).

“I haven't fled my country. Political prisoners and prisoners of conscience release themselves.”

Ledezma, who has been under house arrest since 2015 for being a dissenter of Nicolás Maduro's government, said his country is 'on the point of permanent collapse'.

Maduro, upon hearing Ledezma had left for Spain, called him a 'vampire' and said Spain was 'welcome to him'.

But he has warned that for the dissident to meet with president Rajoy would be an 'unfriendly act' on Spain's part towards Venezuela.

Concerning talks due to be held on December 1 and 2 in the Dominican Republic between Venezuela's government and opposition, in which former socialist president of Spain José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero is expected to act is arbiter, Ledezma said that if Zapatero had 'let his voice be heard' so that the Venezuelans could have 'carried out a referendum revoking' the new autocratic régime voted on earlier this year, the country 'would have saved between 100 and 200 deaths'.

Read more at thinkSPAIN.com

THE WORLD'S first baby has been born from an automatically flash-frozen egg after his mother was treated in a Barcelona clinic.

Although the birth was on September 29, the news has only just broken because medics wanted to ensure the baby was in good health and developing properly after being born.

He was born naturally at 37 weeks, weighing just 2.2 kilos (4lb 13.6oz) and measuring 46 centimetres (1'7”) in Italy, and was said to be in excellent health when he came into the world.

His mother went through what is known as 'oocyte cryopreservation' – the technical term for having her eggs frozen – at the Dexeus Mujer private fertility clinic in the Catalunya capital.

The method involves extracting eggs, then freezing them immediately after a swift cleaning and testing, in liquid nitrogen at -196ºC.

Flash-freezing reduces the risk of ice crystals forming, and until recently, could only be carried out manually.

But a year ago, a new technique was introduced whereby the eggs could be flash-frozen automatically using an hermetically-sealed container which prevents them getting into direct contact with the liquid nitrogen.

Known as a 'GAVI System', the new technology prevents the eggs becoming contaminated by outside elements and reduces any possible interfering factors that may arise through manual freezing, which has to be done by an experienced embryologist.

Read more at thinkSPAIN.com

A GALICIA hospital is trying out a new method of taking biopsies from patients using only a blood test.

The Álvaro Cunqueiro Hospital in Vigo, Pontevedra province, has launched clinical trials to see whether the so-called 'liquid biopsy' method would be accurate enough to replace the traditional process.

If it is, this means patients would have their results within a maximum of two hours, rather than having to wait for a minimum of two days, as is the case with the current method.

Were a blood test to suffice, a biopsy on a suspect lump or cell cluster – a common way of testing for cancer – could be carried out at an outpatient's nurses' station, saving resources, since at present, biopsies are conducted by surgeons or interventional radiologists.

Read more at thinkSPAIN.com

TRAFFIC pollution in Granada could threaten the Alhambra Palace, warn scientists from the city's university.

Researchers say that although it has very little industry, Granada's air pollution levels are similar to those of much larger cities such as Madrid, especially because of the constant flow of traffic.

And although the Alhambra is set on a hill outside the main hub, it is already showing subtle signs of being affected, investigators say.

Vehicle pollution is not the only problem – currents of Saharan wind are also taking their toll on the Palace, the university team alerts.

Winds coming from the south bringing desert sand are not uncommon on Spain's east coast, but the Sierra Nevada mountain range acts as a buffer and 'contains' the Saharan air over the city.

Read more at thinkSPAIN.com

FOSSILS of giraffes dating back nine million years found in a Madrid archaeological dig have shed light on how the species has evolved – and revealed that the earliest examples did not have the characteristic long neck of present-day ones.

According to the Miquel Crusafont Palaeontology Insitute of Catalunya (ICP) and the National Museum of Natural Sciences (MNCN), the Decennatherium Rex is the earliest-known and most primitive giraffe species and a direct ancestor of the tall spotted varieties people travel to safari parks worldwide to see.

Nowadays, the giraffe family has only four species, which live in the sub-Saharan African savannahs, plus the Okapi, a distant relative which lives in the forests of the Congo and does not have a long neck.

The fossils were uncovered at a dig on the Cerro de los Batallones hill in Torrejón de Velasco, just outside the city of Madrid – yet, in modern times, they are only ever found on the African continent, except for those bred in captivity in safari parks.

They have been dated to the end of the lower Myocene era, which started around around 19 million years ago – although those actually found are 'only' around nine million years old – a time when the Eurasian and African continents were joined by land and giraffes were able to wander between what is now, in fact, three continents.

This ancient giraffe species was unknown until a few days ago when the MNCN and ICP team finished their analysis of fossils found over a period of 10 years – a collection said to be 'one of the best in the world ever discovered' of the giraffe family.

A report on the finding, published in the magazine Pius One, cites the ICP's associate researcher Israel M. Sánchez as saying: “Unlike today's giraffes, the Decennatherium Rex did not have the distinctive long neck, and also had four osicons – a pair of antler-like appendices above the eyes and another pair, much larger and more curved, behind.”

Read more at thinkSPAIN.com

TAKING antibiotics without prescription causes more deaths per year in Spain than car crashes, according to the European Medications Agency.

Residents in Spain consume some of the largest amounts of antibiotics on the continent – some 16% above the European average.

Of the 25,000 people who die in Europe every year through antibiotic abuse, one in 10 – or a total of 2,500 – are in Spain.

That's more than the number of fatalities seen annually on Spain's roads, according to motoring accident figures compiled by the General Directorate of Traffic (DGT).

Overuse of antibiotics causes bacteria to become resistant to treatment and to multiply out of control, or to mutate into much stronger bugs that current medication has not yet become developed enough to kill off.

Read more at thinkSPAIN.com

CAMERAS designed to spot drivers and passengers not wearing their seatbelts are now in operation and offenders caught will face fines of €200 and a loss of three licence points, confirms Spain's General Directorate of Traffic (DGT).

By law, camera locations must be disclosed – as is the case with speed traps – and a list has been published on the website DGT.es.

For the last few months, those drivers who were caught on standard traffic police radars not wearing a seatbelt would only receive a letter informing them they had been seen and reminding them of the dangers, but would not be fined unless they were actually caught by an officer at the roadside.

The same would apply if a child was spotted without the correct restraint or booster seat for his or her age, or sitting in a parent's lap in the front seat.

But from Saturday, anyone filmed on the new cameras will indeed be fined, and the offender will receive a letter with a photograph as proof in the same way as they would if caught by a speed camera.

Read more at thinkSPAIN.com

RUSSIAN ambassador in Spain Yuri Korchagin has slammed claims about Kremlin-funded media sources seeking to discredit the latter country during the Catalunya referendum weeks using bots, fake Twitter and Facebook accounts, and pro-Chávez websites in Venezuela.

A front-page headline in Spanish national daily broadsheet El País yesterday (Saturday) claimed 'digital disruption' by Russia Today (RT) and Sputnik, both owned by the State of Russia, had led to the proliferation of damning information and focused on police violence on voting day.

The report cited a study of over five million social media accounts by visiting researcher Javier Lesaca at the USA's George Washington University, which showed that around 32% of profiles distributing Kremlin news sources about Catalunya were invented and another 30% or so were linked to Chávez sympathisers.

Korchagin says the reports are not only 'erroneous', but 'highly dangerous'.

“Various manifestations of populism exist, the most common being some politician or another wielding sensationalist slogans which are, nevertheless, not really viable, but there are also populists among press reporters,” the ambassador states.

“The most distinctive feature of all populists is that of proposing easy and even primitive solutions - which are, by definition, impossible – to a complex problem.”

Korchagin says the actions of 'certain Spanish reporters' is 'very disappointing'.

Read more at thinkSPAIN.com

AN ANTI-RACISM protest in Madrid has called for an end to undocumented migrants being held in internment centres, and for foreigners living in Spain to be allowed to vote.

Held on the 25th anniversary of the murder of Dominican Republic national Lucrecia Pérez – Spain's first-known victim of racist violence, back in 1992 – the march started from the Roman goddess roundabout known as the Plaza de Cibeles and continued as far as the Puerta del Sol square, carrying banners calling for 'a racism-free society', an end to CIEs, or migrant internment centres, no more Armed Forces at borders and for the Foreigners' Law to be scrapped.

Protesters, who were of numerous nationalities, including Spanish, called for a new Foreigners' Law designed by the country's international community which would cover, among a long list of other issues, an end to all discrimination and random ID checks on the street.

It would also 'guarantee foreigners' political rights', such as allowing non-Spaniards to stand for election in regional and national government, not just in local councils, and also let them vote in all elections.

At present, only EU nationals are allowed to vote in local council and European Parliamentary elections, but even these are not permitted to cast their ballots in regional or national elections.

Read more at thinkSPAIN.com

MOTORSPORTS prodigy Marc Márquez scooped up his fourth world championship in five seasons today (Sunday) at Cheste (Valencia province) in a race where he only had to stay on his bike and finish in the top 11 to clinch the title.

Although practically a certainty, Catalunya-born Márquez, 24, could still have seen the championship slip from his grasp at the eleventh hour if he had come 12th or less and his nearest rival, Italy's Andrea Dovizioso (Ducati Desmosedici GP17) had won – and every seat was filled at the circuit today with fans eager to witness the showdown.

Márquez (Repsol Honda) came third, whilst his team-mate and fellow Spaniard Dani Pedrosa netted his seventh Cheste win ahead of second-placed Johann Zarco (Yamaha), a French rider who has burst onto the scene this year with some very impressive results.

Dovizioso suffered a fall, just after the 2015 champion Jorge Lorenzo – who had been given the order by radio to let the Italian pass – and, at one point, during an ongoing head-to-head battle with Zarco, Márquez nearly bit the dust as well, which could have put paid to his world title.

With seven laps left before the end, Márquez overdid the braking and looked certain to come off, but managed to stay on by the skin of his teeth – or rather, his knee, which he stuck out and rammed into the ground.

Márquez, from the town of Cervera in the land-locked province of Lleida, became the youngest-ever rider to win the world championship at MotoGP level in his rookie year in 2013, aged just 20.

He went on to repeat the performance in 2014 and 2016, and has now netted a fourth, having only failed to win it in one season of his career on the top rung of the sport, in 2015, when his compatriot Jorge Lorenzo scooped up his third world championship.

It was not a done deal from the start, however – Spain's Maverick Viñales, a relative newcomer who had yet to make the top five in any race, won twice at the start of the 2017 season, his second at MotoGP level.

And Dovizioso was just 12 points behind Márquez after winning the Malaysian Grand Prix a fortnight ago – had the gap been closed to nine points or fewer, it would have been touch and go for the catalán.

Read more at thinkSPAIN.com

RESERVOIRS in Spain are at their lowest levels in 22 years due to a lack of rainfall in recent years, sitting on average at just over a third full.

Following the driest October so far this century, the total amount of water held in reservoirs at present is 20,920 cubic hectometres, which translates to 37.31% of total capacity at the end of a consistent seven months of dropping levels – the lowest since the first week in November 1994, when they fell to 35.13%, and the most sparse in the 22 years since natural water supplies plummeted to historic lows – reaching 24.81% in November 1995.

The average rainfall for October was 26 litres per square metre – 2.6 centimetres, or about an inch – barely a third of the typical amount seen in what used to be the wettest month of the year, especially in the Mediterranean.

A drought that has been ongoing since around 2013, the last year has been the eighth-worst in 31 years, according to green campaigners Ecologists in Action.

Falling water reserves have been ongoing since 2015 in some rivers, such as the Duero in Castilla y León – which becomes the Douro when it reaches Portugal – the Segura in the southern Alicante-Murcia area, and the Júcar in the province of Valencia and north of Alicante.

Read more at thinkSPAIN.com

AN ATTEMPT at a region-wide shutdown in Catalunya yesterday (Wednesday) 'failed spectacularly' according to Spain's national government – although travellers and commuters on the high-speed AVE trains and outer suburban Cercanías lines were not convinced.

Staged by separatist campaign groups Òmnium and the Catalunya National Assembly (ANC) – whose leaders, Jordi Cuixart and Jordi Sànchez respectively, are in prison charged with sedition – the strike had little impact on business in general, barely making a dent in industry or retail, but huge protests blocked the train lines at Barcelona's central Sants station.

Demonstrators, mostly students, carried banners calling for 'political prisoners' to be freed.

Read more at thinkSPAIN.com

CHAIRWOMAN of Catalunya's Parliament Carme Forcadell has been granted bail with a release fee of €150,000, despite the Spanish prosecution calling for her to be remanded in custody.

Sra Forcadell (pictured), one of the main drivers of Catalunya's independence referendum, will still have to spend the night in the Alcalá Meco prison and will have a week to pay up.

Three other members of the Parliamentary table – Lluís Corominas, Lluís Guinó and Anna Isabel Simó – were also expecting to be remanded in custody at the prosecution's recommendation, but along with Ramona Barrufet, they have been given a week to pay a €25,000 bail release.

A fifth member of the Parliamentary board, Joan Josep Nuet, has been released without charge, since he voted against Catalunya's declaring independence.

Now-ex president of Catalunya, Carles Puigdemont – who remains in Belgium after fleeing there and being arrested and then released with charges – wrote on Twitter that Carme Forcadell 'is spending the night in a prison cell for permitting a democratic debate'.

“That's Spanish democracy for you,” Puigdemont tweeted.

Read more at thinkSPAIN.com

EUROPE'S biggest inland beach will be open for bathers from the year 2020 in a town well over 400 kilometres from the nearest coast.

Alovera, in the land-locked Castilla-La Mancha province of Guadalajara, is barely 50 kilometres from Madrid, so it is often quicker for inhabitants to fly to the closest beach from Barajas airport.

But it will have its own in less than three years, thanks to a €15.6-million investment by the construction firm Rayet.

A 25,000-metre lake – over six acres – bordered by 15,000 metres (3.7 acres) of sandy shores with the usual kiosk-type beach bars, a huge water park, and even a watersports area are included in the complex designed by an international company which specialises in inland beaches, Crystal Lagoon.

Areas clearly separated from each other for safety and comfort will include a sailing zone, bathing area, children's pool and slides, a watersports school teaching kayaking, paddle-surfing and other popular sea-based activities, and a sports and training area with beach volleyball courts, zip-lines and an outdoor gym.

Read more at thinkSPAIN.com

COLOMBIAN pop-rocker Shakira is reported to have been involved with the so-called 'Paradise Papers' offshore scandal recently revealed, in which names such as Germany's Princess Corinna zu Sayn Wittgenstein – a close friend of King Juan Carlos – U2's Bono, Madonna, and even Queen Elizabeth II of England have appeared.

More and more names have been appearing in the 'Paradise Papers' list, although so far all those whose identities have been made public have said they believed their actions had always been legal.

Shakira, 40, who has two small sons with FC Barcelona midfielder Gerard Piqué, is reported to have placed up to €31.6 million in accounts in Luxembourg and Malta to benefit from their preferential tax régimes.

Her solicitor Ezequiel Camerini explains that his client has owned a property in the Bahamas since 2004, when she had been living in Miami with her then long-term boyfriend Antonio de la Rúa.

“Over the next few years, [Shakira] had to travel non-stop and spent most of her time in different countries – as part of her Sale el Sol tour, she gave 110 concerts around the world,” Camerini explains.

“She also spent long periods of time in the USA when she was a judge on The Voice.”

The €31.6m in royalties for her music has been earnt over the past 10 years and was managed by the company Turnesol Limited, based in Malta, Shakira's lawyer reveals.

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OLYMPIC gold medallists who put Spain on the map in Rio 2016 have won National Sports Awards, according to the honours listing released yesterday (Monday).

The prizegiving ceremony, as yet sine die, will be hosted by the Royal family who will give out the awards that bear their names.

Nearly all of them are medal-winners or outstanding competitors from last year's Olympics, although other sports personalities and institutions will get prizes for their exceptional contributions.

Lydia Valentín won the bronze for weight-lifting last year in Brazil, which at the time was her first Olympic medal – but doping tests on medallists from London 2012 and Peking 2008 a year ago led to their being disqualified and Lydia being awarded the gold for the former and the silver for the latter.

Maialén Chourraut (pictured, centre) won the individual women's gold and Saúl Craviotto took the individual men's bronze and the doubles gold with Cristián Toro in kayaking.

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AN INDEFINITE rubbish collection strike started today (Monday) at 07.00 in Madrid as unions battle for improvements in working conditions and pay.

Refuse collection in the city is carried out by three franchise firms through their 1,600 or so employees, but changes in their labour agreement – which have to be signed off by unions – appear to threaten their job security.

Loading wheelie-bins into refuse lorries has always been a three-person job, but the firms now only want one person to do it – and, as this affects every neighbourhood in Madrid, it could mean up to two-thirds of employees would become surplus to requirements.

Other changes mean their general working conditions would become less favourable, and there is no mention of pay rises – at least, not of sufficient salary increases to reflect living costs and the type of work carried out.

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FORMER president of Catalunya Carles Puigdemont and his four ministers who fled to Belgium with him have been released from custody with charges, but are not permitted to leave the northern European country.

Clara Ponsatí, Meritxell Serret, Antoni Comín and Lluís Puig – ex-regional ministers of teaching, agriculture, health and culture respectively – and Puigdemont were reported to have been arrested at exactly 09.17 yesterday (Sunday) morning, but later reports claim they voluntarily attended the police station after agreeing with the Belgian prosecution to do so in light of the international arrest warrant issued by Spanish National Court judge Carmen Lamela.

They all testified separately before a judge in Brussels yesterday between 16.00 and 20.00 in the prosecutor's office and left the building in a minibus without giving any statements to the media.

About 50 reporters had gathered outside the prosecution headquarters in the hope of Puigdemont and his ministers giving a press conference, but were disappointed.

Some 15 individuals were also waiting outside, waving Catalunya regional flags and shouting 'good luck' and 'you're not alone'.

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DEPUTY regional president of Catalunya Oriol Junqueras and eight ministers have been remanded in custody – all bar one without bail – charged with rebellion and sedition for their involvement in the disputed independence referendum on October 1.

National Court judge Carmen Lamela has opted to put them behind bars as she considers them a flight risk and believes they may attempt to destroy evidence.

Junqueras and seven ministers appeared in court yesterday (Thursday) charged with rebellion, sedition and misuse of public funds, for having used taxpayers' cash to finance the referendum.

As well as Junqueras, the former ministers for land and housing (Josep Rull), interior (Joaquim Forn), employment (Dolors Bassa), justice (Carles Mundó), presidential affairs (Jordi Turull), international affairs (Raül Romeva), governing (Meritxell Borràs) and business (Santiago Vila) are now in jail.

Only Santiago Vila has been granted bail, to the tune of €50,000.

Sra Lamela has adhered strictly to the prosecution's recommendations, stating that the offences they are considered to have committed are 'very serious'.

Their defence insists Junqueras and the ministers are 'totally against violence' and 'have not perpetrated any violent actions', but Judge Lamela said the defence was 'forgetting that they were behind a movement' which the regional government 'consented to and supported' and that led to 'activities where organised tumultuous gatherings took place'.

She considers that if the ministers had not been 'egging on' the public, the independence movement would not have had any 'impulsion'.

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CONSUMER protection legislation now in force in Spain means arbitration between customers and firms is free of charge to the former, and no limits apply to the amount of a claim.

The new law is the enactment of a European Union directive which requires all consumers resident in member States to have the right to resolve issues relating to goods and services purchased without cost and without going through the courts.

All consumer disputes must be resolved within 90 days of the company receiving the complaint.

Spain's government has removed the lower limit of claims, previously €30, and the upper limit, which was €10,000, and consumers no longer have to pay a fee, which used to be set at a maximum of €30.

The legislation also prevents companies from insisting on their own arbitration services, or one of their choice, being used.

Goods and services purchased by residents in EU countries from companies based in any EU member State, even if the two countries are different, are covered, as are purchases made in person, by telephone, mail order, or internet.

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CARLES Puigdemont and five of his now-ex ministers have reportedly fled to Belgium to seek political asylum in the only European country where EU nationals can do so.

They are said to have appointed a lawyer who has previously worked for prisoners belonging to the Basque terrorist cell ETA.

Catalunya's regional president, who was dismissed along with his entire cabinet on Friday by the central government as it took control of the north-eastern territory, is expected to give a press conference at 12.30 this afternoon (Tuesday) from an 'undisclosed location'.

Meritxell Borrs, Meritxell Serret, Antoni Comín, Joaquín Forn and Dolors Bassa are said to have travelled to Brussels yesterday by air via a connecting flight in Marseille, France.

Their flight comes after Belgian immigration minister Theo Francken said Puigdemont could seek asylum in the country – a comment from a Flemish nationalist in favour of Flanders' independence which was not generally taken seriously.

Lawyer Paul Bekaert, said to be working for Puigdemont and the other five, insists the issue of political asylum 'has not been discussed' and that the former Catalunya leader 'is not in Belgium to seek refuge' as 'nothing has been decided yet in that area', according to an interview he gave on Flemish TV station VRT.

Bekaert's office is based in Tielt, in the west of Belgium, and he famously represented ETA terrorist Natividad Jáuregui when Spain called for her return for trial in 2004, 2005 and 2015, successfully leading Belgium to refuse to deport her.

Catalunya's ex-deputy president Oriol Junqueras has refused to comment on Puigdemont's possibly seeking asylum, merely reporting that his former boss 'has gone to Belgium for work'.

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