EU court clears Spanish amnesty hurdles

The EU's highest court ruled on 16 July that Spain's Catalan amnesty law does not breach EU law. The judgment removed one European-level objection to the statute. It did not remove the obstacle keeping Carles Puigdemont in Belgian exile: Spain's Supreme Court still refuses to apply the amnesty to his case, and his national arrest warrant remains active (CURIA press release No 112/26, Euronews).

What Luxembourg actually decided

Spanish courts had asked the Court of Justice of the European Union, sitting in its most authoritative Grand Chamber formation, three questions. Does the amnesty law harm EU financial interests? Does it violate EU anti-terrorism rules? Does its two-month deadline for judges to act force them to ignore pending EU legal guidance?

The answers were narrow. Amnesty is a member-state prerogative. Public spending linked to the Catalan independence push did not automatically damage the EU budget (Brussels Signal). EU anti-terrorism rules did not forbid an amnesty aimed at political reconciliation (Al Jazeera). And if the law's deadline would force Spanish judges to rule before Luxembourg could answer a referred question, judges must set that deadline aside (CURIA press release).

The court did not declare Puigdemont amnestied. It did not order Spain to lift his arrest warrant. It did not decide whether the law's own exclusion for conduct involving "personal enrichment" covers what he did. Those questions belong to Spanish courts (Politico, CURIA press release).

Two courts, two paths, both in Madrid

The Supreme Court controls Puigdemont's criminal file. Its investigating judge has refused to apply the amnesty to the remaining misuse-of-public-funds charge. The reasoning matters: the amnesty law excludes conduct that involved personal benefit, and the judge treats Puigdemont's alleged use of public money for the independence push as exactly that kind of conduct (el Constitucional, NRC). The CJEU weakened one pillar of that refusal by dismissing the EU-budget argument. But the domestic question survives: does the "personal enrichment" exclusion fit his case? That is Spanish law, not EU law.

A second route runs through Spain's Constitutional Court. In June 2025, it ruled the amnesty law broadly compatible with the Spanish constitution (Brussels Signal). Puigdemont has now filed an amparo, a constitutional appeal arguing the Supreme Court's refusal to apply the amnesty violates his fundamental rights. If the Constitutional Court overturns the Supreme Court's reading, both the warrant and the amnesty decision would have to be revisited (NRC).

Until a Spanish court formally lifts the arrest warrant, returning from Belgium carries real legal risk. Belgian and Dutch press are clear: this is a step closer, not a free pass (De Morgen).

Why Europe is watching a Spanish case

Press across multiple countries covered the ruling as more than a domestic matter. German reporting recalls 2018, when a Schleswig-Holstein court handled a Spanish extradition request for Puigdemont and showed that European Arrest Warrants (the system by which one EU country asks another to surrender a suspect) do not erase national legal categories (Deutschlandfunk). The question in 2018 was whether another country would enforce Spain's warrant. The question in 2026 is whether Spain itself applies its own amnesty. European courts can remove EU-law objections, but they cannot make a member state use the law it passed.

The CJEU drew the line between what EU law can block and what remains a national choice. Spain's amnesty survived that line. Whether Puigdemont benefits from the law his movement inspired is now entirely for the Spanish Supreme Court and Constitutional Court to decide. Luxembourg narrowed the case. Madrid still controls the door Puigdemont wants to walk through.