Politics
Catalonia’s President Says Jail Beats Staying Spanish
A soccer match in 1979 started Carles Puigdemont’s journey toward regional president.
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Carles Puigdemont’s political epiphany came in 1979, when he joined thousands of fellow Catalan fans who traveled by bus to Basel, Switzerland, for the final of a European soccer championship.
Barcelona beat Fortuna Dusseldorf, and the experience made Puigdemont decide that his future lay with his region. Today, he’s Catalonia’s president, and he’s wrestling with a national constitutional and economic crisis spawned by his decision to push for secession from Spain.