Catalonia’s sacked leader Carles Puigdemont delivers a speech during a meeting with Catalan mayors in Brussels on November 7, 2017. Around 200 pro-independence Catalan mayors flew to Brussels on November 7 and held a protest demanding the release of their region’s “political prisoners”. Puigdemont claimed on November 7, 2017, that he fled to Belgium because Spain was preparing a “wave of oppression and violence” against his separatist movement. / AFP PHOTO / Emmanuel DUNAND

The speaker of the Catalan parliament on Monday proposed the region’s ousted leader Carles Puigdemont as president of Catalonia following an election in December in which separatist parties once again won an absolute majority.

Puigdemont

Roger Torrent said Puigdemont’s candidacy to once again head Catalonia’s regional government is “absolutely legitimate”, even though the secessionist leader faces criminal proceedings over his role in Catalonia’s independence drive.