The Día de les Illes Balears is commemorating the Estatuto de Autonomia Balear (Statute of Balearic Autonomy) that was given to the Spanish Autonomous Region of the Balearic Isles 26 years ago today, on March 1st, 1983. A range of festivities will be held today in Palma and elsewhere, and have already been held for two or three days. In celebration of Balearic Autonomy, March 1st is a public holiday, but this year the holiday coincides with a Sunday. Oh, well.

Spain is politically organized into a total of 17 comunidades autónomas (autonomous communities), the Balearics being one of them, plus 2 ciudades autónomas (autonomous cities), Ceuta and Melilla.

On the occasion of the Día de les Illes Balears 2009, Medallas d’Or were awarded to Jørn Utzon, Juan Llaneras, UIB (the University of the Balearic Isles) and the Riu family (for their Riu group of hotels). A number of Premios Ramon Llull 2009 were also awarded. All awards were presented by the President of the Govern de les Illes Balears, Francesc Antich last Friday night at the Auditorium in Palma.

The photo (top) was taken in Palma de Mallorca, Baleares, Spain. The date: December 27th, 2008. The time was 12:28:36. The photo (bottom) was taken from the Internet, courtesy of Diario de Mallorca (photo: Sebastià Llompart). Moltes gràcies. The map was downloaded from Wikipedia under the GNU Free Documentation License. Many thanks.