EXILED former Catalan president Carles Puigdemont has called for the Spanish government to agree to discussions on self-determination as a condition of his PDeCAT (Democrat) MPs accepting budget proposals from Pedro Sanchez.

The Spanish prime minister only managed to oust his predecessor Mariano Rajoy with support from pro-independence Catalan and Basque members and he needs them to approve his financial plans.

But he has rejected attempts by Catalan President Quim Torra to discuss self-determination.

Although Puigdemont fled Catalonia to avoid being jailed following the October 2017 referendum and declaration of independence, many still regard him as the rightful president, including the incumbent Quim Torra.

Puigdemont warned Sanchez: “In the current circumstances there can be neither approval of the budgets nor we must lend ourselves to the processing of budgets in this context.

“We have enabled Mr Sanchez to talk about budgets, but despite the constant appeals and gestures, today the government Pedro Sanchez in relation to the political conflict in Catalonia has exactly the same policy as the Rajoy government.”

Puigdemont was speaking from the House of the Republic, in Waterloo, Belgium, surrounded by members of his party leadership and as Torra was in the US, highlighting the inability of the Catalan people to exercise their right of self-determination.

Last night he was speaking at Stanford University following an invitation from its Martin Luther King

Institute. He said it would give him the chance to explain to a US audience “what worries Catalans”.

“The trial that will soon be opened against Catalan politicians is a trial against democracy and against the right to self-determination in Catalonia,” he said.

“Right now, civil rights and the right to self-determination are closely linked.

“We will go wherever we need from all over the world to explain the seriousness of the Catalan political situation, with political and exiled prisoners and with the right to self-determination.”

On these points, Torra said neither Rajoy nor Sanchez had taken any steps to resolve a political situation that needed a political solution.

Today he will visit Silicon Valley, and before returning to Catalonia he is expected to visit Washington, to meet some US congressmen think tanks, and civil rights groups’ representatives.

Meanwhile, Sanchez has refused to meet a group of MEPs that was formed in 2017 to support a dialogue between the EU and Catalonia.

Thirty cross-party MEPs from the EU-Catalonia Dialogue Platform wrote to the Spanish prime minister asking to meet him tomorrow, when he is due to attend a session of the European Parliament in Strasbourg.

However, his office said that he was only in Strasbourg for one day and was due to meet a delegation from his own PSOE (Socialist) party and would not have time to meet the MEPs.