Puigdemont cleared to return to Spain as judge lifts arrest warrant after amnesty ruling

Judge Pablo Llarena’s decision on Tuesday also removes the national search and arrest orders against former Catalan ministers Toni Comín and Lluís Puig. It comes a day after Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez announced a snap general election for 29 November, placing a major development in the long-running Catalan legal dispute at the start of the election period.

However, the lifting of the warrants does not yet constitute a decision to grant Puigdemont or the two former ministers amnesty. Llarena said he would determine the next steps after examining the Constitutional Court’s judgment in full. 

The immediate trigger was the Constitutional Court’s decision to uphold an appeal by former Catalan minister Dolors Bassa, challenging the Supreme Court’s refusal to apply the 2024 amnesty law to her embezzlement conviction.

Although Bassa’s case concerns a politician already convicted, its outcome has direct implications for Puigdemont and other independence leaders whose legal proceedings have remained unresolved because of the dispute over whether the law covers their use of public money. 

Arrest orders lifted immediately, pending further ruling

According to state broadcaster RTVE, Llarena declared the warrants against Puigdemont, Comín and Puig ineffective ‘with immediate effect and until a further express judicial ruling’.

The judge acknowledged that he had not yet received the full text of the Bassa judgment. Nevertheless, he said the substantial similarities between the facts and the disputed legal issues meant the Constitutional Court’s decision could affect the grounds on which he had maintained the arrest orders in a ruling dated 1 July 2024.

Llarena stressed that withdrawing the warrants neither extinguishes criminal liability nor settles the other outstanding questions in the proceedings.

Once the complete judgment is available, he will decide without delay whether to confirm or modify Tuesday’s decision, issuing a reasoned ruling and following the required legal procedures.

The order requires immediate notification to the National Police, Guardia Civil and the Catalan regional police, the Mossos d’Esquadra, as well as any other authorities to which the warrants had been sent. They must refrain from detaining the three politicians on the basis of those orders. ALSO READ: Three Mossos officers suspended following Puigdemont’s escape from Spain.

Constitutional Court backs amnesty for embezzlement

The Constitutional Court approved the decision on Bassa’s appeal by seven votes to five, addressing one of the principal obstacles to the full application of the amnesty law.

The Supreme Court had previously held that the legislation did not cover the embezzlement offences attributed to several senior figures in the Catalan independence movement. That interpretation left Puigdemont subject to arrest despite the law’s passage. ALSO READ: Spanish Supreme Court refuses to grant Puigdemont amnesty despite EU court ruling.

Tuesday’s ruling is expected to provide the legal basis for decisions on related appeals involving Puigdemont, Comín, Puig, Oriol Junqueras and Raül Romeva.

The court’s deliberations began with the appeal brought by former Catalan minister Jordi Turull. 

In his draft judgment on Bassa’s appeal, prepared last week, the court’s president, Cándido Conde-Pumpido, supported applying the amnesty law to independence-related embezzlement offences ‘as a matter of priority and urgency’. ALSO READ: Constitutional Court clears path for Puigdemont’s return and full amnesty for independence leaders.

He argued that the Supreme Court’s refusal to do so conflicted with the legislature’s intention. His draft described its reading of the law as an ‘expansive interpretation, contrary to the spirit and purpose of the legislation’, whose objective was the normalisation of the situation in Catalonia.

It also challenged the Supreme Court’s reasoning that the independence process involved personal gain and therefore fell within an exception to the amnesty. According to the draft, that approach stripped the legislation of its substance and ‘turns the exception into the rule’.

A legal dispute rooted in the 2017 independence bid

Puigdemont led Catalonia’s regional government when it organised the 2017 independence referendum, despite a court ban, and subsequently attempted to separate the region from Spain. Click here for all our reports related to Catalan independence.

The confrontation became one of the country’s most serious political crises in decades. Puigdemont left Spain for Belgium afterwards to avoid arrest and has remained based there.

The embezzlement allegations against him concern the use of public funds to organise the referendum. The Supreme Court’s interpretation of those allegations had prevented him from benefiting from the amnesty alongside hundreds of other people involved in the independence movement.

Around 400 people have benefited from the legislation, which was intended to ease tensions arising from the failed independence bid. ALSO READ: Controversial Catalan amnesty law gets final approval in Spanish Congress.

The law was approved in 2024, following negotiations in which Catalan separatist parties secured an amnesty commitment in return for supporting Sánchez’s return to office after the 2023 general election, which produced no clear parliamentary majority. READ: The PSOE and Junts sign a pact that will guarantee investiture of Pedro Sánchez. 

Decision comes as Spain heads towards an election

The amnesty agreement helped define the current legislature, but disagreements over its implementation subsequently contributed to the deterioration of relations between Sánchez’s socialist party (PSOE) and Puigdemont’s Junts per Catalunya (JxCat) party.

Junts withdrew its support for the government, accusing Sánchez of failing to honour commitments, including securing the effective application of the amnesty to its leader.

Last Friday, the party joined the right-wing People’s Party (PP) and far-right Vox group in rejecting two government housing decrees, dealing another defeat to Sánchez’s minority administration amid widespread protests over the housing crisis.

Sánchez announced on Monday that Spain would hold an early general election on 29 November. 

Tuesday’s judicial decisions therefore open the possibility of Puigdemont returning during the election period, while leaving the final resolution of his own amnesty case dependent on further action by the Supreme Court.

JxCat said Puigdemont would hold a press conference later on Tuesday in Waterloo, Belgium, where he currently lives.