Catalonia’s representative office in Brussels has been ordered by Spain to prevent a meeting between sacked Catalan president Carles Puigdemont and the region’s parliamentary speaker, Roger Torrent.
“The representative of the Catalan government in Brussels has been instructed not to allow this meeting to take place in the building of the Catalan diplomatic mission,” a source told the Agence France-Presse (AFP) before the meeting was due to take place.
As reported by Deutsche Welle (DW), Germany’s international broadcaster, Puigdemont was formally designated last week by Torrent – another separatist – as the candidate to lead the region again.
Puigdemont has said he would aim to run again for the position from which he was ousted in December by the Madrid government, if necessary from outside Spain.
Madrid sacked Puigdemont and his entire government after the Catalan parliament declared unilateral independence in October.
He is charged with rebellion, sedition and misuse of public funds and faces arrest if he returns to Spain. He has been living in Belgium in self-imposed exile since the end of October.
On January 23, Puigdemont asked to return to Spain “without any risk” of being detained.
“My intention in the coming days is to contribute to restoring democracy in order to respect election results,” he said.
