Toni Comín to Cross the French Border on Foot on 24 October

Former councillor Toni Comín will return to Catalonia on Saturday, 24 October at noon, crossing a mountain pass in the Pyrenees on foot, according to a private letter sent to his circle. The decision comes after Judge Pablo Llarena provisionally lifted the arrest warrant.

The former councillor Toni Comín has informed his circle of friends that on Saturday, 24 October, at 12 noon, he will cross the French border on foot via one of the passes connecting Catalunya Nord with the Principality. The information, reported by moncloa.com, specifies that it is a walk of less than an hour, which Comín himself describes as "very simple".

The choice of format is due to two reasons. The practical: on foot is the only way for all his companions to cross the border at the same time, without relying on vehicles or separate controls. The symbolic: he wants the moment of stepping onto Catalan territory to coincide with the moment when he claims to regain "full freedom".

In the letter, Comín thanks his circle for their support during these nine years of exile, which he believes have made the distance "less burdensome". He adds:

"I can’t find a better way to thank you than to invite you to share the precise moment of my entry into the territory of the Principality."

He assures that he had promised this decision to many of them a long time ago.

There is a less symbolic reason behind the date. Comín needs to return to the Spanish State to pledge the Constitution, a requirement set by electoral law and without which he cannot take possession of his seat in the European Parliament. That seat has been vacant since June 2024, when the European elections were held. 28 months have passed with a chair unoccupied in Brussels and Strasbourg.

In practical terms, the return strengthens the representation of Junts in the Eurochamber, a group that has used the hemicycle as a platform for the Catalan conflict since 2019. Pledging the seat requires stepping on Spanish soil, and this procedure, which should be routine, is here the last obstacle in a judicial journey of nearly a decade.

The judicial calendar is not closed. Supreme Court Judge Pablo Llarena provisionally lifted the arrest warrant, and the final decision will not arrive before Thursday, 15 October, when the deadline for the parties to respond expires. The ruling affected three people: Comín, President Carles Puigdemont, and former councillor Lluís Puig. The reason is the ruling of the Constitutional Court that supports applying amnesty to the crime of embezzlement.

Comín is the first of the three to specify how and when he returns. Puigdemont has limited himself to saying that his return will be "in service of the country and not the party". His circle points out that it will not be before the general elections on 29 November. And his lawyer, Gonzalo Boye, insisted this Tuesday on Catalunya Ràdio that the president "will not return in the middle of an electoral campaign, which is what the PSOE would want".

The difference in strategy is not accidental. Junts does not want to give the PSOE the photo of normalisation in the middle of the campaign. Comín, on the other hand, plays with another incentive: the seat. Each week that passes without pledging the Constitution is a week without a voice or vote in the European Parliament.

There is an evident risk on the table. If the Supreme Court reverses the provisional decision, and there is room for that until Thursday, Comín could be in Catalonia with a reactivated arrest warrant. Puigdemont already staged a lightning return to Barcelona in 2024, returning to Belgium the same day. That was a political act without procedural consequences. This is different: it is the first step of a return with institutional effects.

There are eleven days left. On Thursday we will know if the ruling is final or if it remains provisional. On Saturday, 24, Comín will cross a Pyrenean pass on foot. And that day, for the first time in almost a decade, one of the three exiles will sleep at home.