Spain Papers Review - Wednesday December 31 2008
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By h.b. - Dec 31, 2008 - 9:43 AM
The ongoing tragedy in Gaza and the future funding of Spain's regions dominate the front pages today.

El País has a front page photo of some of the devastation caused by the Israeli bombardment of Gaza, and says that Israel is ignoring the world clamour to stop the punishment of Gaza. The paper says that 380 Palestinians have been killed.
El Mundo also with a large front page photo of bombed buildings in Gaza and the statement from Israel ‘This is only the first stage’. The paper has a statement from the Israeli Minister of Defence, Ehud Barak, has said that ‘operation solid lead’ will continue until needed.
ABC says that Brussels has demanded a 48 hour cease fire is Israel is considering a ‘humanitarian treaty’.

El País leads with the headline that the new Zapatero plan to fund the regions will favour the richest autonomous communities.
The paper says the Minister for the Economy, Pedro Solbes, wants to correct the lack of balance in the sharing out of the money.
El País considers that the plans favour all regions with the exception of Madrid, Cataluña and the Baleares.
El Mundo has a different take and headlines that all the regions will see more money, but this will come at the cost of a larger state debt. The paper highlights a comment by the leader of the Partido Popular, Mariano Rajoy, who declared it as a ‘tremendous error’ to keep on writing cheques.
The paper notes that the plan sees the regions collecting 50% of IRPF income tax, and that finally the Government admitted that the plan could increase the deficit by 1%.
ABC says that the concessions of Solbes still do not meet the demands of the regions. The paper says that Cataluña has complained despite the plan being copied from their statute.
La Vanguardia, published in Barcelona, says that Solbes plan does not convince the Catalan Govern, and the other Catalan paper, El Periódico, headlines ‘There is still no deal’ and says that Catalan President, José Montilla, thinks the new financing proposal is ‘insufficient’.
Público describes the Solbes plan as a ‘made to measure suit but without figures’.

El País reports that the Prosecutors’ Office has called for jail for the 14 Islamists who recruited suicide bombers in Spain. They face prison sentences of between 7 and 14 years.

El País notes that the year ends with numbers in the red, with the Bank of Spain confirming recession, the stock market suffering its largest annual fall in history (just under 40%) and housing falling in price by 3% in the third quarter.
El Mundo notes the stock market has ended the year 39.4% down with losses of 338 billion.
El Mundo tells us that the transport, electricity, water and telephone costs are to increase tomorrow by more than double the IPC inflation rate.
ABC says the cabinet has now confessed that there is a recession.

ABC notes that in a tragic year for domestic violence nearly half the victims killed by their partners in 2008 were foreigners. Non Spaniards made up 40% of the total.

And finally,
Under the headline ‘ignorance’, Público has a feature on ‘The famous and their crazy ‘scientific ideas’. It’s a look at scientology and has a picture of Tom Cruise.


There are no Spanish papers published on New Year’s Day.

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