Exiled in Belgium, has Carles Puigdemont met his Waterloo?

When reports suggested that Carles Puigdemont had moved to the Belgian town of Waterloo, satirists were not quick to miss the joke.

A cartoon in Belgium’s main francophone daily, Le Soir, showed the Spanish prime minister, Mariano Rajoy, smiling and waving his nation’s flag as Catalonia’s former president unpacks his boxes outside a suburban house. “It’s only the start,” read Rajoy’s speech bubble. “After this, Saint Helena!”

The town is close to the site of Napoleon’s last stand before banishment to the remote Atlantic island. The Catalan leader arrived last October to avoid jail after his unilateral declaration of independence deepened the region’s political crisis.

More than four months into his self-imposed exile, Puigdemont has now suffered an unmistakable defeat on the political battlefield. He announced on Thursday that he was abandoning his attempt to return to the presidency in place of a jailed colleague.


Source : theguardian