It must be very tough for the Spanish justice system to receive one dressing down after another for all the decisions it's taking relating to the members of the Catalan government who went into exile or are in prison and the Jordis. This Three Kings' Day, a European Parliament decision has been communicated which should shame its different recipients: the Central Electoral Commission, in the first instance, and, also, the Supreme Court.
The note from the European Parliament couldn't be blunter: "Following the judgement of the Court of Justice of the European Union dated 19th December 2019, at the plenary sitting of 13th January 2020, the European Parliament will take note of the election as Members of the European Parliament of [Toni Comín, Oriol Junqueras and Carles Puigdemont]." Full stop.
The Central Electoral Commission won't respect it in the case of Junqueras and the Supreme Court is maintaining the arrest warrants for Puigdemont and Comín. That Spain doesn't respect European decisions is clear and it's to be hoped it's penalised at some point since the current situation is not acceptable. The news should this Tuesday take up an important space in the print papers edited in Madrid and some of those in Barcelona, especially because they sold to their readers the idea that this circumstance wouldn't come about. It was a great lie at the service of the deep state, like so many others which have been spread over these last two years.
In a Spain which is living on the alert for a possible tamayazo1 and in which, a few hours before the definitive investiture of Pedro Sánchez, PSOE has to urge its delegates to bring forward their journeys to Madrid just in case, the justice which comes from Europe doubtlessly stings. But it's not sufficient if no correction is made. And that, today, sadly, remains very very distant.
Translator's note: 1. The "tamayazo" occured in 2003 during the vote to invest Rafael Simancas (PSOE) as president of Madrid. During the second round, Eduardo Tamayo and María Teresa Sáez, from his own party, abstained, leading his candidacy to be unsuccessful.