Spanish Constitutional Court overturns Catalan bullfight ban

The Spanish Constitutional Court on Thursday voted to overturn the ban on bullfighting in the Catalan region of Spain.

The Court argued that the ban, which was approved in 2010 and came into effect on Jan. 1, 2012, is illegal as bullfighting is part of Spain's cultural heritage and as such the Catalan regional authority does not have the right to prohibit it.

Catalonia had been the first region of Spain's mainland to prohibit bullfighting, although the move was opposed by the right-wing People's Party.

Reaction to Thursday's decision came rapidly with Ada Colou, the Mayor of Barcelona, which is home to the region's only bullring -- El Monumental, posting a tweet insisting the local authority would "work so that the sentence has no effect. We will do everything possible."

"Not only are we opposed to it both politically and socially, but we will also use Catalan and municipal regulations which prohibit any mistreatment of animals," she commented.

The ruling has also been criticized by the Catalan regional government with Josep Rull, the Secretary for the Environment and Sustainability holding a press conference to assure the regional authority would do "everything possible to that bullfighting does not re-appear" in the region.

"We want it to be impossible to hold a public spectacle based on the death and suffering of an animal and we will develop all of the regulations to ensure the will of the Catalan people expressed in the Parliament prevails," he said. Endit