Spain issues arrest warrant for Puigdemont

A Spanish judge issued an international arrest warrant Friday for former members of the Catalan Cabinet who were last seen in Brussels, including the ousted separatist leader Carles Puigdemont who said he was prepared to run for his old job even while battling extradition in Belgium.

The National Court judge filed the request with the Belgian prosecutor to detain Puigdemont and his four aides, and issued separate international search and arrest warrants to alert Interpol in case they flee Belgium. Puigdemont’s Belgian lawyer has said that his client will fight extradition to Spain without seeking political asylum.

The five are being sought for five different crimes, including rebellion, sedition and embezzlement in a Spanish investigation into their roles in pushing for secession for Catalonia.

The officials flew to Brussels after Spanish authorities removed Puigdemont and his Cabinet from office Saturday for declaring independence for Catalonia. The Spanish government has also called an early regional election for Dec. 21.

Puigdemont told the Belgian state broadcaster that he was in Belgium “ready to be a candidate” in the early polls and because he had lost faith in the Spanish justice system.

“We can run a campaign anywhere because we’re in a globalized world,” he told RTBF, adding that he was not in Belgium to “Belgianize Catalan politics.” “I did not flee, but it’s impossible to properly prepare” a legal defense while in Spain, he told the broadcaster.

Belgian prosecutors said they would study the warrant and then give it to a judge. If Belgium acts on the international warrant issued by Spain and arrests him, Puigdemont would have to be brought before an investigating judge within 24 hours.

His extradition procedure would take 15 days, Belgian legal experts say. But should Puigdemont appeal, that process could take a further 45 days, meaning that he would probably not leave Belgium before early January, well after the elections.

In her decision Friday, Judge Carmen Lamela said that Puigdemont “apparently is in Belgium” and accused him of “leading the mobilization of the pro-independence sectors of the population to act in support of the illegal referendum and thus the secession process outside the legal channels to reform the constitution.”

Spain says the only legal way to achieve secession is by reforming Spain’s 1978 Constitution with an ample majority in the national Parliament, not by regional votes.

The arrest warrant came a day after the same judge jailed nine former members of Puigdemont’s separatist government. All members of the ousted Cabinet were ordered to appear at Spain’s National Court Thursday to answer questions in a rebellion investigation.

Five of them, including Puigdemont, didn’t show up. Spanish prosecutors want to charge members of the dismissed regional government – as well as six additional members of the regional Parliament – for promoting official steps to declaring Catalonia’s independence.

Meanwhile, a panel of National Court judges Friday rejected an appeal seeking the release of two separatist activists who were jailed last month in a separate sedition investigation. A National Court spokesman said the President of the Assemblea Nacional Catalana Jordi Sanchez and Omnium Cultural leader Jordi Cuixart will remain in a Madrid jail while the investigation continues. The spokesman spoke on condition of anonymity in line with court policy. Sanchez and Cuixart are being investigated for allegedly orchestrating protests that hindered a judicial investigation to halt preparations for a banned independence referendum held on Oct. 1.Puigdemont and his Cabinet were removed by Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy, who used extraordinary constitutional powers authorized by the Spanish Senate to depose the separatists, dissolve the regional legislature and call the early regional election.

Spain’s Supreme Court is also investigating six members of Catalonia’s Parliament. The court postponed a hearing Thursday until next week to allow more time for them to prepare their defenses in the case. In all, Spanish prosecutors are investigating 20 regional politicians for rebellion and other crimes that would be punishable by up to 30 years’ prison.