Letter by C. Puigdemont MEP and T. Comin MEP to colleagues (15 JAN 2020)

Here is the text of the letter sent by two of the three Catalan MEPs who, as such, enjoy immunity. The third, Oriol Junqueras, has not been let out of prison by the Spanish authorities. Moreover they are trying to strip him of the European Parliament seat he won last May.
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Source: https://www.elnacional.cat/ca/politica/puigdemont-comin-carta-presentacio-eurodiputats-parlament-europeu-justicia-espanyola_460425_102.html

Introducing ourselves as new members of the European Parliament

Dear Colleagues,

We would like to thank you all for your welcome on this Monday that comes after a tremendous legal battle for the recognition of the rights of our voters. We would not be here if not for two relevant resolutions from the European Court of Justice, of 19th and 20th of December 2019, which acknowledged us as members of this chamber in representation of more than 2 million European citizens. 

These two resolutions not only recognized our rights, and the rights of more than 2 million European citizens, but also ratified the fact that Europe needs a common electoral law that regulates the European electoral process to avoid abuses from administrative and judicial bodies within member states.

Our case is the case of the European values, of the fundamental rights recognized, among others, in the Lisbon Treaty and we as representatives of a national minority within Spain, the European citizens living in Catalonia, are here to give voice to our people and to help to consolidate a strong, democratic and united Europe.

We became members of this chamber, as all of you did, after a successful election the past 26 of May, obtaining more than 2 million votes, but until now we have been prevented to fulfil our duties as MEP because of the illegal actions of the Spanish Central Electoral Authority and the Supreme Court of Spain.

This illegality, which represents a democratic abnormality, has been revised by the European Court of Justice the past 19th and 20th of December in two relevant rulings that are to be kept in mind as a milestone in the resolution of the conflict existing between our country and Spain.

There is technical confusion, which may mislead some of you, by those who argue that the ECJ resolutions were fair. The ECJ does not resolve based on fairness or unfairness but in law and this means that all the Court has done, but nothing less, is to express the correct way to interpret the Union ́s law.

The ECJ resolutions from 19th and 20th of December [1, 2] are to be respected by all Member State including Spain and I must stress the fact that the Spanish Supreme Court has not done it neither in our case nor in the case of our colleague Mr. Oriol Junqueras, who was vice-president of our Government until we were removed from office by the Government of Mr. Rajoy. 

Even after the rulings of ECJ, the Supreme Court of Spain refused to assume the consequences of recognizing our immunity, and Mr. Junqueras remains in prison and we have an active National Arrest Warrant in Spain as well as an active European Arrest Warrant.

We all, as members of this legislative chamber, are entitled to the protection of immunity and any sort of restrictions to the immunities recognized in article 9 of the Protocol of Immunities are a serious violation of both the European and the International Law as it has been clearly established by the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in its judgment of 14 February 2002.

The ICJ Judgment of 2002 ruled that “the issue... of the arrest warrant..., constituted violation of a legal obligation..., in that failed to respect the immunity from criminal jurisdiction and the inviolability... enjoyed under international law”. This resolution is binding for all states including the EU Member States and this Parliament.

Even so, we must stress that the Spanish Supreme Court by maintaining the European Arrest Warrants against us both and also by maintaining Mr. Junqueras in prison is clearly acting against the above mentioned ruling of the ICJ as well as against the resolutions from the ECJ of 19th and 20th December 2019 [1, 2] but, above all, it is a clear indication that for the Spanish Supreme Court neither the international law nor the ruling of the Internationals and Europeans courts are relevant nor need to be respected.

Mr. Junqueras and 6 other politicians and civil society leaders remain in what the United Nation has established as an “Arbitrary Detention” and a “political prosecution”. The conclusions of the United Nation Working Group for Arbitrary Detentions (UNWGAD)[3, 4] are not only relevant but also binding for all nations and for this Parliament.

The fact that in a member state we can find political prisoners, as established and so defined by UNWAGD, is an abnormality that represents the way in which the Spanish Supreme Court, in particular, and the whole Spanish judiciary, in general, have been acting for several years to suppress the wishes and rights of the people from Catalonia.

Our people, European citizens, are entitled to the right to determine their own future, exactly the same as the people from Scotland and what we have done is simply to materialize this right through a referendum that has not been recognized neither by the Government from Spain nor by the Spanish Constitutional Court.

As a result of that lack of recognition, the Spanish Supreme Court has used its means to imprison several members of our government and 2 civil society leaders and after an arbitrary process has convicted them for facts that do not constitute a crime in the rest of Europe.[5]

It is not only us who say that what we Catalans have done is not a criminal offence, it has been ruled so by the High Court of Schleswig-Holstein in July 2018 [6] and that resolution is firm and irrevocable. What our government has done in organizing a referendum is not a criminal offence in any member state but only in the view of the Spanish Supreme Court and of the Spanish judicial hierarchy.

The Spanish Supreme Court is the only Court in Europe that does not accept nor recognize this relevant ruling and, by doing so, the Spanish Supreme Court is violating European Law and attacking the pillars of the Union as established in article 3.2 of the Treaty on the European Union.

This situation leads us to another major European challenge: the need to harmonize the different criminal codes existing in the Union as the current situation creates a conflict with the right to freedom of movement which is a core value of the Union.

We, as MEP, have the responsibility to ensure what is established in the Union ́s Treaty: “The Union shall offer its citizens an area of freedom, security and justice without internal frontiers, in which the free movement of persons is guaranteed” which is exactly what the Supreme Court of Spain is not willing to accept.

As you all know, Spain initiated its democratization process some 42 years ago, and that has not and is not an easy task, nor is it being adequately realized. One of their pending problems is the one affecting the high instances of its judicial system.

We all must be in favor of the independence of the judicial and no doubt can be raised about it. The problem in Spain is that the judicial not only have a lack of counter-powers or “checks and balances” but also have its own political agenda.

The political agenda of the hierarchy of the Spanish Judiciary represents the reminiscences of francoism, represents a democratic abnormality, an attack to our freedom and a perversion of their functions which undermines their impartiality and allows them to use and abuse of the instrument placed in their hands by the citizen.

Their political agenda is also against the spirit of the Union and its regulations as it has been shown in our case through the constant violation of our rights, of our immunity and the permanent misuse of the Council Framework Decision of 13 June 2002 on the European arrest warrant and the surrender procedures between Member States [7].

Spain has a problem and their problems are our problems as European citizens. Spain ́s problem is not Catalonia nor our right to self-determination, or worded in European terms, our rights as a national minority within Spain, but its judiciary which is interfering in the political activity by conditioning it based on their own agenda and retrograde vision on how Spain should be and behave.
 
We are also here to help to solve the Spanish problem but not in the way the Spanish Judiciary wants. We want to resolve this problem with Europe, with a stronger Union in which we all, as European citizens, feel comfortable.

Our case is not a problem but an opportunity, an opportunity to assume new challenges such as:

• a) To develop a common electoral regulation to the European elections which prevent situations like the one we experienced in which an Electoral body misled this Parliament towards the electoral results,

• b) A common criminal code which prevents a member state from considering something a criminal offence which no other member state considers as such, as this affects the freedom of movement and the legal security.

We are willing at any time to meet with you and explain to you more about the situation of the European citizens living in Catalonia, and share with you our views for a better and stronger Europe.

Best regards,


Carles Puigdemont i Casamajo MEP
Antoni Comin i Oliveres MEP


[1]  No 161/2019 : 19 December 2019 Judgment of the Court of Justice in Case C-502/19 Junqueras Vies 
SPANISH: https://curia.europa.eu/jcms/jcms/p1_2695227/en/
ENGLISH: https://curia.europa.eu/jcms/jcms/p1_2695226/en/
FRENCH: https://curia.europa.eu/jcms/jcms/p1_2695178/en/


[2] No 166/2019 : 20 December 2019 Order of the Court of Justice in Case C-646/19 P(R) Puigdemont i Casamajó and Comín i Oliveres v Parliament. 
SPANISH: https://curia.europa.eu/jcms/jcms/p1_2699089/en/
FRENCH: https://curia.europa.eu/jcms/jcms/p1_2699098/en/

[3] UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention. Opinion 6/2019 (Spain) A/HRC/WGAD/2019/6. 13 June 2019. https://www.ohchr.org/Documents/Issues/Detention/Opinions/Session84/A_HRC_WGAD_2019_6.pdf

[4] UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention. Opinion 12/2019 (Spain) A/HRC/WGAD/2019/12. 10 July 2019. https://www.ohchr.org/Documents/Issues/Detention/Opinions/Session84/A_HRC_WGAD_2019_12%20ADVANCE%20EDITED%20VERSION.pdf

(full list: https://www.ohchr.org/EN/Issues/Detention/Pages/Opinions84thSession.aspx)

[5] SPANISH: http://www.poderjudicial.es/portal/site/cgpj/viewDocument?ECLI=ECLI:%20ES:TS:2019:2997
ENGLISH: http://www.poderjudicial.es/stfls/TRIBUNAL%20SUPREMO/NOTAS%20DE%20PRENSA/20191216%20STS,%20Sala%202,%2014-10-2019%20-%20Sentencia%20proc%C3%A9s%20INGL%C3%89S.pdf
FRENCH: http://www.poderjudicial.es/stfls/TRIBUNAL%20SUPREMO/NOTAS%20DE%20PRENSA/20191216%20STS,%20Sala%202,%2014-10-2019%20-%20Sentencia%20proc%C3%A9s%20FRANC%C3%89S.pdf

[6] [Deutsch] https://www.schleswig-holstein.de/DE/Justiz/OLG/Presse/PI/201806Puigdemontdeutsch.html

[7] https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=celex%3A32002F0584