2024-07-28 08:59:58
Catalan separatist leader Carles Puigdemont, who has been in exile since 2017, vowed today to return to Spain to take part in the inauguration debate for Catalonia’s next prime minister despite an arrest warrant issued against him, AFP reported.
“This is what I promised to do, and this is what I will do /…/. So it is my duty to go to the (Catalan) Parliament if there is a debate on the nomination. I will be there,” Puigdemont said at a meeting of his “Together for Catalonia” party in the French town of Amelie-le-Ben Pallada, located 25 km from the Spanish border.
The former Catalan prime minister expressed hope that if he returns, “the authorities will avoid what would be an illegal detention, an arbitrary detention.” According to him, he should be amnestied, BTA reported.
Puigdemont, who fled the failed secession attempt of Catalonia in 2017 to avoid prosecution by Spanish justice, spoke today for the first time in public after Spain’s Supreme Court on July 1 refused to allow him to take advantage of the amnesty for Catalan separatists.
Accused of embezzlement and under investigation for treason, Puigdemont could be arrested if he returns to Spain.
The Supreme Court ruling came as a bolt from the blue at a time when the amnesty law, which was painstakingly negotiated to allow Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez to stay in power, should have applied primarily to Puigdemont.
In mid-May, the Socialists won a landslide victory in regional elections in Catalonia, where Puigdemont’s separatists lost their majority.
The candidate of the Socialists for prime minister of the region, Salvador Ilya, who is still far from forming a majority, is conducting negotiations with the other major separatist party – the Republican Left of Catalonia, but without guarantees of success.
If the next Catalan prime minister is not sworn in by August 26, new elections will be scheduled, possibly in October, AFP said.