Burcu Arik
17 January 2018•Update: 18 January 2018
By Hasan Esen
MADRID
Roger Torrent -- a member of the pro-independence Republican Catalan Left (ERC) party -- was elected as the new speaker of the Catalan Parliament on Wednesday.
The Parliament of Catalonia convened for the first time after Dec. 21 snap elections in which separatist parties maintained their majority in the regional parliament.
Torrent beat an anti-independence candidate by winning 65 votes against 56.
During the session, yellow ribbons -- the symbol of separatists -- were placed on empty seats of imprisoned parliamentarians and Catalan leader Carles Puigdemont, who fled to Belgium following unilateral independence vote on Oct. 1.
The new speaker Torrent is supposed to choose a candidate to form a government by the end of January.
Separatist parties want Puigdemont to lead the region again, but it raises many complications in Spain.
If Puigdemont returns to Spain, he will be automatically arrested, as he faces serious charges of rebellion and sedition for leading the Catalan parliament to declare independence in late October.
Although his supporters insist that Puigdemont can potentially take oath by video link from Brussels, Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy argues that it is not possible.
