Juan Carlos I arrived in Abu Dhabi a day like this Thursday August 4 two years ago. But it was necessary to wait thirteen days until lunchtime on August 17, 2020, for the Palacio de la Zarzuela to reveal the final destination of a trip in a private plane that left Parispicked up the emeritus king in Madrid, made a stopover in Sanxenxo to transfer him from there to the capital of the United Arab Emirates.
“HM King Juan Carlos has instructed the House of His Majesty the King to communicate that on the 3rd day of this month of August He moved to the United Arab Emirates (USA), where he currently remains & rdquor ;, the announcement said.
In its goodbye letterbroadcast by Zarzuela on August 3, 2020, the king emeritus explained that his “considered decision & rdquor; to leave Spain It had to do with the “public impact that certain past events in my private life are generating.” He added: “My legacy, and my own dignity as a person require it of me & rdquor ;. And that in this way he was going to “contribute to facilitating & rdquor; to his son, King of Spain Felipe VI the responsibility of the Head of State.
In other words, this “considered decision & rdquor; that Juan Carlos I assumed as his own was a kind of sacrifice for Shield the House of His Majesty King Felipe VI to the news about alleged illicit activities in the Geneva Prosecutor’s Office and in the Spanish Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office first, since the end of 2018, and the Supreme Court Prosecutor’s Office at that time, since June 2020.
different meetings
Juan Carlos I met for a few afternoons, before publicly announcing his decision to leave Spain with different personalities. Some of them have told El PERIÓDICO that the emeritus was very emotional and sad and that he had heard various opinions from his interlocutors, most of them censoring the decision. But the emeritus let it be understood that he had no alternative. Some of those interlocutors understood that it was a agree with your son to prevent the news from splashing into the Royal House and occupying the focus of the monarchy for the following years. Others believed that the then vice president Carmen Bald had personally explained the message of the departure to the head of the House of His Majesty the King, JAlfonsin’s soul, as the opinion of the Government of Pedro Sánchez.
Despite assuming that the game was the result of a “considered decision & rdquor; personal, comments made by the emeritus at his residence in Abu Dhabi personally targeted Pedro Sánchez as the mastermind of what he had sold as that “considered decision & rdquor ;.
Two years later, the Government of Sánchez and Zarzuela are incapable of treating citizens as adults. While right-wing politicians and media maintain that Sánchez is the bad guy in the film, the Palacio de la Moncloa remains silent, without giving a credible explanation.
Corinna’s lawsuit
The source of the discredit of the Spanish monarchy -the main reason why Juan Carlos I remains in self-banishment- is the High Court of Justice of England and Wales and the Court of Appeals, civil division, as a result of the processing of the civil lawsuit for alleged acts of harassment, illegal monitoring of agents of the Spanish National Intelligence Center (CNI) in Monaco, Switzerland and London, presented by his ex-lover Corinna Zu Sayn-Wittgenstein on December 29, 2020.
If this was not clear, at the hearing on July 18, held at the Court of Appeals, where it was confirmed that the trial will continue at least for the events subsequent to the abdication of Juan Carlos I in mid-2014, the defense of the emeritus explained it.
The lawyer-‘barrister’ Timothy Ottyhired to present the arguments of the new defense -the Carter-Ruck law firm- of the emeritus before the Court explained that “exposing members of the family of a Head of State [de Juan Carlos I y Felipe VI] in a foreign jurisdiction [Reino Unido] would harm the “dignity of the monarchy that is necessary for its representation and would influence the activity of the king [Felipe VI] even if Juan Carlos I does not live with him or assist him in his work & rdquor ;.
Therefore, the dignity of the emeritus is linked, according to the new lawyers, to the dignity of the House of His Majesty King Felipe VI.
The judges of the Court did not buy this argument or the reasoning with which the defense concluded its construction: appeal the sentence of March 24 last that denied all immunity based on the fact that the Kingdom of Spain and the Spanish Royal House are “friends” from United Kingdom.
They therefore refused to appeal based on this point before the Civil Court. The law, they explained in their sentence, “cannot be built guaranteeing immunity to members of the royal family because there would be a risk of harming the dignity of the head of state, this cannot cover someone in the position of Juan Carlos I, who neither live with the king [Felipe VI] nor does he share or assist him in his work & rdquor ;.
The judges also pointed out that “the Kingdom of Spain has not shown any interest in the immunity of Juan Carlos I & rdquor ;.
Paradoxically, the defense strategy of the emeritus in London collides with the speed that the Palacio de la Zarzuela would like to complete the case. Because the partial appeal allowed -on facts of the harassment lawsuit in the pre-abdication period 2012-2014- lengthens the procedure for a few months, and extends the entry into the evidence that Corinna will present -predictably in October or November- before the investigating judge Matthew Nicklin.
And, therefore, a decision on the self-banishment of Juan Carlos I.
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