Manhunt on in Spain for fugitive Catalan separatist leader Puigdemont

Aug. 8 (UPI) -- Spanish authorities launched a manhunt for the wanted separatist former leader of Catalonia, Carles Puigdemont, after he popped up to address a rally of his supporters Thursday near the Catalan Parliament in Barcelona seven years after he fled abroad -- and then promptly vanished.

Police set up roadblocks in the capital of the autonomous region and on routes out of the city after Puigdemont, who has been living in exile in Brussels for most of the time since being charged with rebellion, sedition and misuse of public funds in 2017, slipped away by car with Spanish media reporting he was helped by a police officer.

Officers were also stopping and searching vehicles near the French border after the Mossos d'Esquadra, Catalonia's regional police force, confirmed one of its officers has been arrested in connection with the investigation into Puigdemont's getaway.

The officer was alleged to be the owner of a car that Puigdemont used to escape.

The then-Catalonia President was removed from office when Madrid imposed direct rule in October 2017 after the Catalan Parliament declared independence from the rest of Spain four weeks after Puigdemont and his Junts Party administration won a referendum held despite Spain's constitutional court ruling it illegal.

Puigdemont appeared at Thursday morning's event ahead of the swearing-in of the new leader of the province's government, telling supporters he wanted to let them know the nationalist movement had not gone away.

"We are still here because we do not have the right to resign ," he said in a speech to about 3,500 people," the El Pais newspaper reported.

"Holding a referendum is not a crime and never will be."

El Pais, one of Spain's newspapers of record, expressed incredulity that Puigdemont had slipped through the grasp of police despite appearing at a public event where hundreds of officers were present and his return to Spain being reported by the media and widely telegraphed on social media.

However, political backers accused the police of doing the bidding of the central government.

"Hundreds of policemen encircle Barcelona to arrest President Puigdemont. A hunt paid with public money to please the powers in Madrid. This is not what a democracy does," Aleix Sarri, former adviser and Junts' secretary for international affairs, wrote on X .

In 2021, Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez approved pardons for nine separatists imprisoned in 2019 for their part in the Catalonia independence movement, commuting their prison sentences and banning them from public office.

Sanchez said the pardons were aimed at trying to heal the rift between Spain and those in autonomous Catalonia who wanted to secede, but the move satisfied no one.

The conservative People's Party slammed Sanchez for appeasing the Catalan Republican Left Party, accusing him of pardoning those who had mounted an illegal coup who had not asked to be pardoned, were not sorry and had threatened to do it again.

Pro-independence politicians were unhappy because pardoning the secessionists, instead of overturning their conviction and declaring an amnesty, meant Puigdemont and several others who fled Spain after warrants were issued for their arrest remained wanted men.

The row rumbled on, culminating in huge People's Party-organized demonstrations in September and November to try to force Sanchez to resign over an amnesty deal proffered in exchange for the support of Catalan Independence parties after he failed to win a majority in a July 2023 snap general election.