Judge Joaquín Aguirre has reactivated the investigation opened into the alleged contacts between Puigdemont’s entourage and Russian emissaries before October 1 within the framework of the so-called Operation Volhov. In an order issued this Monday, the magistrate extended the case for six months and opened the door, although he did not mention it in the document, to charge Puigdemont and his collaborators with high treason, a crime that would prevent them from benefiting from the future law of amnesty. High treason involves colluding with a foreign power to harm Spain.
“This magistrate has reviewed the abundant documentation having found data that identifies people and that would confirm the close personal relationships existing between some of those investigated with individuals of Russian, German or Italian nationality, some of them while they held diplomatic positions or relations with the services Russian secrets, other influential members of far-right political parties and with an interest in establishing relations of political and economic influence with the Government of Catalonia if it became unilaterally independent from Spain,” he underlines.
And he adds: “or, a war would start between the European Union and Russia, being, apparently and according to some messages found on the mobile phone of the investigated Terradellas, the invasion of Ukraine and the consequent limitation of the gas supply to Europe the first important step of the political strategy of the Russian government and its president Putin for the destabilization of democracy and the European Union.”
The judge suggests that Puigdemont promoted the negotiations with the Kremlin. “If the contacts with the Kremlin existed before and after October 2017, the deduction can be drawn that there was some person common to (Víctor) Tarradelles and (Josep Lluís) Alay and above them who would allow such contacts between leaders of Convergencia Democràtica , now Junts per Catalunya, and the Kremlin”.
Furthermore, the judge adds that he has examined various messages crossed between Tarradellas – who was the secretary of international relations of the CDC – and Nikolay Sadovnikov, a former diplomat from that country who was invited to the Palau de la Generalitat on October 27, 2017 and who should be “very high-level contacts, since Sadovnikov “knew that Russia’s invasion of Ukraine was going to begin.” “The chats also confirm Tarradellas’ trips to Moscow to deal with Jordi Sardà Bonvehí, a businessman with contacts in Russia, and senior officials of the Kremlin”. These messages “also mention Tarradellas’s intention to be accompanied by a Catalan personality, whose name is not specified, in order to explain to this personality the offers that Russia makes to Catalonia.”
According to Terradellas’ declaration before the judge, Carles Puigdemont met with two alleged emissaries from the Kremlin’s entourage days before the unilateral declaration of independence. The alleged Kremlin envoys offered military and economic support to a future independent Catalan state but Puigdemont “did not give them credibility,” according to Terradellas’ testimony. The meetings took place on October 24 and 25, 2017 at the Casa dels Canonges, the official residence of the president. They chose that location because they did not consider the meeting to be official. The former president, Terradellas, and the former mayor of Barcelona, ??Elsa Artadi, participated in both meetings.
The first was attended by Sergey Motin, a deceased Russian citizen, and the second was attended by former Russian diplomat and businessman Nikolai Sadovnikov. In them, the supposed emissaries promised to send 10,000 Russian soldiers once independence had been declared and to finance the future Catalan state through cryptocurrencies. During the meeting, he said, Carles Puigdemont was “stunned” and said that the Russians’ offer seemed like “a joke in bad taste,” according to Terradellas.
