The former Catalan president Carles Puigdemont is to appear in court following his arrest in Germany, which triggered a wave of protests in Catalonia where thousands of separatists confronted police. Puigdemont, who has been living in self-imposed exile in Brussels since October, was travelling in a car on the way from Finland to Belgium on Sunday when he was detained, having visited Finnish lawmakers in Helsinki.

German police arrested him after he crossed the border from Denmark, under a European arrest warrant reactivated on Friday by Spain, where he is wanted on charges of sedition, rebellion and misuse of public funds.

Puigdemont, who has been held in prison in the town of Neumünster since his arrest, will be brought before a German judge on Monday afternoon to confirm his identity and decide if he is to remain in custody. The state court in Schleswig-Holstein will rule at a later date on whether to put Puigdemont in formal pre-extradition custody on the basis of documents provided by Spain. German government officials have stressed that the case is a matter for the judicial system, but declined to say on Monday whether the government could ultimately overrule a court decision.(theguardian)…[+]