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The president of the PPC (Catalan Popular Party), the regional branch of the party currently in government in Madrid, Xavier Garcia Albiol, has said that president Carles Puigdemont's comments during today's press conference in Brussels have caused him an "enormous embarrassment".

Albiol believes it "irresponsible" for him to say that he would be in danger in Catalonia and that "he still hasn't realised that he is no longer president of the Catalan government", rather a "normal citizen, with serious problems with the justice system".

In a press conference, the PP leader said that the 21st December elections are an "opportunity" to "win in the face of the insult and the lie of the independence movement" and to "continue working from the Catalan government to maintain what [prime minister] Rajoy has started with the application of article 155".