The European Parliament yesterday voted to lift the immunity of the former president of Spain’s Catalonia region, Carles Puigdemont, and two of his associates, a move that could pave the way for their extradition and reopen the scars of separatism in Spain.
The Spanish government immediately welcomed the decision by the EU’s legislature as a victory for the rule of law and against those who sought to break the rich northeastern region away from the rest of Spain.
The decision will likely also extend the three-and-a-half-year legal saga on the fate of the three separatists by months, if not years, since many avenues for appeal remain open before any possible extraditions.
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In the decision on Puigdemont, 400 legislators voted for the waiver of immunity, 248 were against and 45 abstained.
The measures to lift the immunity of his associates — former Catalan health minister Toni Comin and former regional education minister Clara Ponsati — were by largely similar margins.
Puigdemont and a number of his separatist colleagues fled to Belgium in October 2017, fearing arrest after holding an independence referendum for Catalonia that the Spanish courts and its government said was illegal.
In 2019, Puigdemont and his two associates won seats in the European Parliament and were afforded protection as members of the EU assembly.
Puigdemont’s lawyer in Spain, Gonzalo Boye, said the former Catalan president would appeal the assembly’s decision to the EU’s higher courts in Luxembourg.
Spanish Minister of Foreign Affairs Arancha Gonzalez Laya said the assembly’s decision showed that Puigdemont and his two aides cannot shield behind their legislative seat to avoid appearing before the national justice.
In a video statement, Gonzalez Laya also said the decision meant that “the problems of Catalonia are solved in Spain, they are not solved in Europe.”
Dolors Montserrat, a European lawmaker with the center-right European People’s Party and a former Cabinet member of the Spanish administration that ousted Puigdemont, told Spanish broadcaster TVE: “Spain wins, Europe wins, democracy wins.”
She added that the decision certified that Puigdemont is “a fugitive who has to answer before Spanish courts.”
Iratxe Garcia Perez, the leader of the S&D Group, said “the European Parliament doesn’t judge anybody. We just guarantee that justice does its job. A clear majority, absolute majority of the parliament, supported the fact that Spanish justice should be able to do its job.”
Despite the wide margin to lift the three lawmakers’ immunity, Boye said the assembly’s backing was not as overwhelming as Spain wanted it to be.
“It’s evident that there are people in the conservative group, in the EPP [European People’s Party], and among the socialists that have voted against,” he told Spanish broadcaster TVE.
The 2017 independence vote in favor of Catalonia breaking away from Spain was a landslide, but those in favor of Spanish unity spurned the vote.
The central government in Madrid declared the vote illegal and unconstitutional.
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