Catalonia’s regional assembly voted on Monday in favour of a resolution to split from Spain, energising a drive towards independence and deepening a standoff with central government in Madrid. The declaration, which pro-independence parties in the northeastern region hope will lead to it splitting from Spain altogether within eighteen months, was backed by a majority in the regional parliament. The fraught debate over Catalan secession has railroaded campaigning for December's national elections away from the country’s lopsided emergence from an economic crisis. Parties favouring independence from Spain won a majority of seats in the Catalan assembly in September. But the Spanish constitution does not allow any region to break away, and the centre-right government of Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy has repeatedly dismissed the Catalan campaign out of hand. The Catalan parliament wants a democratic process of massive, sustained and peaceful disconnection from the Spanish state.