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		</div><p>Catalan leader Carles Puigdemont has taken his seat as a member of the European Parliament in Strasbourg despite facing an arrest warrant against him in Spain.</p>
<p>The former Catalan president and new EU legislator is bent on using the parliament as a platform to continue his political fight for an independent Catalonia breaking away from Spain.</p>
<p>His parliamentary position also gives him immunity.</p>
<p>Puigdemont used the opening session of the plenary to demand the immediate release from a Spanish jail of another Catalan leader who was elected to the European Parliament, former Catalonia vice president Oriol Junqueras.</p>
<p>He waved a yellow poster demanding “Free Junqueras” in his first act as a parliamentarian.</p>
<p><em>“He should be here with us. He has the same rights,”</em> Puigdemont said earlier.</p>
<p>His ability to have such exposure at the heart of the European Union to decry such issues as imprisonment in Spain is a blow to the central authorities in Madrid, who have steadfastly sought to blunt the drive to give the wealthy north-eastern region independence.</p>
<p>Left-leaning parties have just formed a Spanish minority government which is dependent on the tacit support of a more moderate Catalan party.</p>
<p>Puigdemont arrived at the legislature in the early afternoon, cheered by a few hundred supporters who had more than a dozen Catalan flags fluttering in the midday winds outside the legislature in north-eastern France.</p>
<p><em>“Puigdemont president,”</em> they shouted in unison.</p>
<p>Puigdemont arrived together with fellow EU legislator and former Catalan minister Toni Comin.</p>
<p>Spain tried to ban us, he said, “but today we are here, finally”.</p>
<p>The two are wanted in Spain for their role in an illegal 2017 secession bid by the Catalan government and separatist politicians.</p>
<p>They fled in exile to Belgium after the attempt failed and were elected to the European Parliament in May as representatives of Catalan separatist parties from Spain.</p>
<p>The regional Catalan coalition government was also in Strasbourg in support, demanding that all three elected politicians should be in Strasbourg, including Junqueras.</p>
<p><em>i</em> Alfred Bosch, the foreign minister of the regional Catalan government, said of Junqueras.</p>
<p>A Spanish court sentenced Junqueras in October to 13 years in prison for sedition.</p>
<p><em>“He has the same rights as we have,”</em> said Puigdemont.</p>
<p><em>“He got more than a million votes. Freedom was not respected.”</em></p>
<p>The European Parliament said it was legally bound not to give the convicted Junqueras a seat.</p>
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