The Court of Auditors returns to ERC the 2.1 million that it deposited as bail for the expenses of the 'procés'

The Court of Auditors has issued an order this Tuesday by which it agrees to return to ERC the deposit of 2,136,164.45 euros that it made in October 2021 and replace it with the guarantees presented by the Generalitat, through the Institut Català de Finances ( ICF).

Both these guarantees and the previous deposit have the purpose of ensuring the payment that derives from a possible conviction for the expenses incurred for the foreign promotion of the

, through Diplocat.

The refund of the amount initially deposited by ERC is a consequence of the acceptance of the guarantee presented by the Generalitat to cover said possible responsibilities.

The Prosecution Section of the Court of Accounts agreed to accept the aforementioned guarantees on February 28.

After this first decision, the legal representation of the former Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Generalitat, Raül Romeva, raised the return of the constituted bonds, an issue on which the Court of Auditors convened a hearing that took place on the 12th.

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The Prosecutor's Office reduces the diversion of funds from the leaders of the 'procés' to 3.4 million

The new order of the Court of Auditors -of which the director Elena Hernáez has been rapporteur- admits the thesis that it was "obliged" to apply the criterion of the directors who accepted the guarantees, "despite having a dissenting opinion of the majority position.

The resolution also underlines that it is a mechanism to "guarantee prior and provisional responsibilities determined in the phase of preliminary actions."

The supervisory body also highlights in its resolution that the Prosecutor's Office changed its position on the validity of the guarantees in the aforementioned hearing, in which it defended them as a guarantee mechanism, while the Catalan Civil Society maintained its request that they be rejected.

The change of position of the prosecutors already took place in last April, when they presented their formal demand for Diplocat's expenses.

At that time, the Prosecutor's Office informed of its modification of criteria, considering that now it is about guaranteeing the payment of the presumed accounting responsibility of those investigated, if it is proven.

In parallel, it reduced its initial claim of 9.5 million euros for the foreign promotion of the procés to 3.4 million euros.

The Court of Auditors, in turn, underlines in the order that it has issued today that the guarantees offered by the Institut Català de Finances meet "the requirements established" by the legislation "to be able to access a substitution of precautionary measures".

In the same sense as the Prosecutor's Office, it adds that "with the substitute precautionary measure, the effectiveness of a possible judgment approving the claims of the plaintiffs continues to be guaranteed", which are the Public Ministry itself and Catalan Civil Society.