‘We have the ability to enter and exit, to challenge a repressive state’

Former President of the Generalitat Carles Puigdemont has stated that his presence in Barcelona this week and his return to Waterloo (Belgium) without being arrested prove several things: “The first is that we have the ability to enter and exit, to challenge a repressive state” and “that we did not surrender, and that I did not go to surrender.” This was stated on Saturday in an interview with TV3 from Waterloo (Belgium).

Puigdemont has appeared before a media outlet for the first time since last Thursday, when he fled Spain after holding a brief meeting at an event organised by Junts per Cataluña. The statements were recorded in his office in Waterloo and in the garden of his home.

In that same video, the former president claimed the application of the amnesty law because he wants to do politics “under normal circumstances”. In the same way, he has confirmed that “there is a court that rebels against the laws approved by Parliament. That is not acceptable. No constitutional state can accept that.”

Regarding his appearance and subsequent escape, he explained that they had activated a plan “that seemed impossible” and that their objective in entering and leaving Spain was “challenging a repressive state”: “We activated a plan that seemed impossible to us, that did not offer many chances of success. I was convinced that it could be stopped easily,” he said. But he stressed that, “if it went well,” That plan allowed him to demonstrate the power of his objectives.

Puigdemont’s return to Barcelona seven years after his departure to Belgium, without being arrested by the Mossos d’Esquadra, despite the operation designed by the regional police, has caused controversy between the regional police and the former president.