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The exiled Catalan minister and number two for JxCat in the European elections in May, Toni Comín, has today warned what could happen to Spain if it rejects the candidature in those same elections of president Carles Puigdemont. According to Comín, Spain could suffer the embarrassment of having to repeat the European elections, a fate that Comín says he would like to "save Spain from" - "and that's not being ironic". "We wouldn't want its reputation in the eyes of the rest of the EU states to continue in free fall," he said in a tweet.

The candidate published the tweet after Puigdemont had presented documentation to Spain's Central Electoral Commission (JEC) to response to the bid by Spanish right-wing parties Cs and PP to veto his candidacy for the European elections. The JxCat allegation says that the claims made by PP and C have no valid legal basis and should be dismissed. They argue that Puigdemont, as well as Toni Comín and exiled Catalan education minister Clara Ponsatí have the right to active and passive suffrage and that denying it would be a violation of European law and international treaties ratified by Spain.

Meanwhile, a reference to this question was also made by Carles Puigdemont's lawyer Gonzalo Boye, in his usual mysterious tone. "I'm going to buy popcorn," Boye said, suggesting that if the JEC upholds the Cs and PP veto, the case will be appealed to European authorities.

"No-one should be mistaken... we never improvise," added the lawyer, giving more clues. 

The JxCat documentation notes several precedents in the European Court of Human Rights' jurisprudence relating to the case of Ukraine, condemned for arbitrarily excluding a politician outside the country from parliamentary elections.