The Greens/EFA group announced on Tuesday 7 January the unanimous election of Catalan pro-independence activist Oriol Junqueras as head of the European Free Alliance (EFA) and first vice-president of the Greens/EFA group.
"We are looking forward to welcoming Oriol Junqueras to Strasbourg next week to take up his seat as an MEP and assume the Presidency of the EFA Group", said French EFA MEP François Alfonsi, who expects the competent Spanish authorities to follow up on the ruling of the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) of 19 December 2019 (see EUROPE 12394/1) and release the Catalan activist. The latter was sentenced in October to 13 years in prison in Spain for sedition and misuse of public funds due to his active participation in the Catalan referendum on self-determination in 2017.
As a reminder, the Court considers that a person elected to the European Parliament acquires parliamentary immunity as soon as the results are officially announced. Immunity covers the travel of MEPs to where meetings of the European Parliament are held from the first constitutive session onwards, it says.
Therefore, the CJEU considers that the benefit of immunity implies the lifting of any measure of pre-trial detention imposed prior to the proclamation of his election, which would apply to Mr Junqueras, as he was sentenced in October (see EUROPE 12348/23), several months after the European elections. There is nothing to prevent national courts from subsequently requesting a waiver of parliamentary immunity (see EUROPE 12394/1).
A long procedure
This kind of waiver of immunity could, however, take several months, a parliamentary source told us, based on his personal experience. A formal request from the competent national authorities must first be made to the Presidency of the European Parliament, which must announce the request at the opening of the next plenary session. The matter is then referred to the Committee on Legal Affairs (JURI). The Committee must then take a decision before submitting its report to the plenary. As a general rule, the European Parliament follows the position of the JURI Committee. However, since the Catalan case is highly political, it is difficult to predict the institution's final position, according to analysis from our source.
The Spanish Supreme Court is expected to take a position on the ruling in the coming days. According to a European source, it would be surprising if it were to oppose the ruling of the CJEU, contrary to the decision taken by the Spanish electoral commission (see EUROPE 12397/6).
For its part, since the December ruling, the European Parliament has accredited the Catalan independence leaders Toni Comín and Carles Puigdemont (see EUROPE 12397/6). (Original version in French by Pascal Hansens)