(MENAFN- The Peninsula)
AFP
Madrid: A top Spanish judge demanded explanations on Friday from Police and government as to how fugitive Catalan leader Carles Puigdemont was able to return to Spain despite a pending arrest warrant and vanish again.
Supreme Court Judge Pablo Llarena, who had issued the arrest warrant for Puigdemont, requested answers specifically from Catalonia's regional police force, the Mossos d'Esquadra.
Puigdemont, who fled abroad after leading a failed 2017 independence bid for Catalonia, defied the warrant to return to Spain on Thursday to deliver a speech to thousands gathered at the Catalan regional parliament in Barcelona.
He then disappeared into the crowd.
Catalonia's regional police said it had arrested two of its officers, including one who owned the car used by Puigdemont to leave the scene.
The force, which has launched a manhunt for 61-year-old Puigdemont, denied there had been any collusion with his entourage and insisted officers had planned to arrest him "at the most opportune time so as not to generate public disorder".
Puigdemont "took advantage of the numbers of people around him and fled the scene in a vehicle that the Mossos tried to stop but failed" the force said on Thursday.
Judge Llarena also asked the interior ministry for details of its plan to arrest him at the border as well as "the orders that were issued" to capture the politician "after his escape", according to documents made public by the Supreme Court.
The judge also demanded the names of "the agents responsible for the design of the operation, those responsible for its approval and those who have been entrusted with its execution or operational deployment".
Puigdemont's lawyer, Gonzalo Boye, told Catalan radio on Friday that his client had fled abroad again, without giving details.
Spanish Justice Minister Felix Bolanos said on Friday the operation to arrest Puigdemont "was the responsibility of the Mossos", whose job it was to enforce court orders in Catalonia.
"In Spain the law must be respected and court orders must be complied with," the minister told journalists at the Olympics.
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