Puigdemont slips out of Finland despite arrest warrant
HELSINKI: Catalonia’s former president Carles Puigdemont foiled attempts by Finnish police to arrest him under a European arrest warrant, after his lawyer confirmed he had left the country.
Puigdemont, who lives in self-imposed exile in Belgium, had been visiting Finland since Thursday for talks with lawmakers.
Tensions are running high in Catalonia and separatist parties have abandoned plans to name a new president following the arrest of the latest candidate.
“I confirm that President Puigdemont is no longer in Finland,” his lawyer Jaume Alonso Cuevillas tweeted, without stating where the former leader was.
Finnish MP Mikko Karna, one of the ousted leader’s hosts in Finland, also said he had “received information that Charles Puigdemont departed from Finland by unknown means to Belgium,” in a statement posted on Twitter.
“Puigdemont confirmed to me today that in Belgium he will fully cooperate with authorities,” Karna wrote, after earlier telling media that he had not been in touch with him since Friday.
Puigdemont is wanted by Spain on charges of ‘ rebellion’ and ‘sedition’. Spain also issued international arrest warrants for five other separatists, including four former ministers who are also in self-imposed exile in Belgium.
Meanwhile in Barcelona, the Catalan parliament suspended its debates after regional presidential candidate Jordi Turull, who had been due to seek a secondround vote in the parliament, was placed in custody over the region’s breakaway bid.
It is the third time that the parliament has been unable to nominate a new president, after Puigdemont and another pro-independence leader, Jordi Sanchez who is currently in jail, were forced to withdraw their candidacies.
If a new president is not elected by May 22, fresh elections will be triggered. And as long has it does not have a government, Catalonia will remain under direct rule from Madrid, imposed after the independence declaration in October last year.