Exiled MEP Clara Ponsatí sets foot in Catalonia for first time in 5 years

Exiled MEP Clara Ponsatí set foot in Catalonia on Saturday for the first time in 5 years.

"It's been an excellent opportunity to get a little bit closer to home," the Junts per Catalunya politician said during an event at the Col de Banyuls mountain pass.

"If I go any further, the Spanish Civil Guard police will probably be waiting for me and that is illegal because I have immunity," she said, adding that Spain has been "violating fundamental rights for the past 5 years."

Ponsatí, who was the Catalan education minister at the time of the 2017 independence referendum deemed illegal by Spain, left the country 5 years ago to avoid prosecution.

In May, the Court of Justice of the European Union provisionally gave her and MEPs Carles Puigdemont and Toni Comín their parliamentary immunity back as it considered they risked arrest. All three Junts politicians have European arrest warrants for their role in the 2017 vote, but Puigdemont and Comín's were blocked by Belgian courts and Ponsatí's was never considered. 

Scotland, where she lived before moving to Belgium, ruled against extraditing Ponsatí in August of 2021 . It did this even though she did not have provisional immunity at the time as Belgian courts decided to halt proceedings until the Luxembourg court decides whether the EU Parliament stripped them of their protection irregularly, as the Junts MEPs allege.