Catalans protest ex-leader’s detention
SPAIN: Demonstrators angered by the detention of former Catalan leader Carles Puigdemont disrupted several roads in central Barcelona yesterday, as protesters continued to wreak havoc on regional traffic, blocking main motorways and roads.
The separatist politician is in preliminary custody awaiting a northern German court’s decision on an extradition request by Spain.
Transportation authorities in the northeastern Spanish region said a main motorway through eastern Spain remained blocked by protesters in Figueres, near the border with France. Demonstrators had also stopped traffic in another highway leading to the city of Lleida, and a national road between Tarragona and Valencia.
Protesters also caused disruptions in several roads in central Barcelona, the regional capital.
The Catalan parliament’s declaration of independence last October following an ad-hoc banned referendum received no international recognition and provoked a takeover of the regional government by Spanish authorities.
Puigdemont was ousted and fled to Belgium. Last week a Spanish Supreme Court judge charged him with rebellion and misuse of public funds.
Spain has issued arrest warrants for six of the seven Catalan separatist leaders who have fled the country. Puigdemont was detained on Monday, shortly after crossing the border into Germany from Finland.
Spanish government spokesman, Minister Inigo Mendez de Vigo, said the separatist leader’s fate was now in the hands of the German judiciary.
In a move celebrated by his supporters, the United Nations Human Rights Committee announced yesterday that it had registered a complaint by Puigdemont alleging that Spain has violated his political rights.
Meanwhile, Clara Ponsati, the former Catalan education secretary, handed herself in to Scottish police yesterday after they received a request for her extradition to Spain. She will begin the fight against her extradition in a court in Edinburgh.
Ponsati travelled to Scotland earlier this month to return to a post at St Andrews University, after four months in self-imposed exile in Belgium with Puigdemont.