German court keeps Puigdemont in custody
NEUM NSTER, Germany: A German court has kept former Catalan president Carles Puigdemont in custody pending possible extradition to Spain to face ‘rebellion’ charges.
Puigdemont will “remain in detention for the time being, until a decision is made concerning the extradition procedure,” the regional court in Kiel, northern Germany, announced Monday, a day after Puigdemont was arrested.
The former Catalan leader’s detention in Germany, which sparked angry protests back in Catalonia, comes five months after he went on the run as Spanish prosecutors sought to charge him with sedition and rebellion in the wake of a vote by the Catalan parliament to declare independence.
The court in northern Germany turned down a request from Puigdemont’s legal team for him to be released pending the extradition decision by German authorities.
He was arrested on Sunday after he crossed the border into Germany from Denmark, under a European warrant issued by Spain. According to Puigdemont’s lawyer Jaume Alonso-Cuevillas, he was on his way back to Belgium, where he fled after Spanish authorities moved to impose direct rule over Catalonia.
His detention marks the latest chapter in a secession saga that has bitterly divided Catalans and triggered Spain’s worst political crisis in decades.
A decision on extradition must normally be made within 60 days under German law. A spokeswoman for the prosecutor’s office for Schleswig-Holstein state told AFP it would ‘probably not come this week’ ahead of the fourday Easter holiday.
In Barcelona Sunday, Catalan police in riot gear shoved and hit demonstrators with batons to keep the crowd from advancing on the Spanish government’s representative office in the capital of Spain’s wealthy northeastern region.
Officers fired warning shots in the air to try to contain the demonstrators, who pushed large recycling containers towards police. Some people threw glass bottles, cans and eggs at police.
About 90 people were slightly injured during the protests in Barcelona, including 22 police officers, emergency services said.