Catalonia holds informal vote on secession

More than a million voters participated yesterday in an informal vote on whether Catalonia should secede from the rest of Spain, officials said.

The regional Catalan government pushed forward with the vote despite Spain’s Constitutional Court ordering its suspension on Tuesday after it agreed to hear the Spanish government’s challenge that the poll is unconstitutional.

The Catalan government said that more than 1.1m of the 5.4m eligible voters had voted by 1pm local time at polling stations manned with more than 40,000 volunteers. Results are expected this morning.