{"id":42029,"date":"2026-06-17T14:33:23","date_gmt":"2026-06-17T14:33:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/42029\/"},"modified":"2026-06-17T14:33:23","modified_gmt":"2026-06-17T14:33:23","slug":"spains-former-pm-zapatero-questioned-by-judge-over-role-in-airline-bailout","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/42029\/","title":{"rendered":"Spain’s former PM Zapatero questioned by judge over role in airline bailout"},"content":{"rendered":"

BARCELONA, Spain (AP) \u2014 Jos\u00e9 Luis Rodr\u00edguez Zapatero, the former prime minister of Spain, appeared before a judge in Madrid on Wednesday in connection with his alleged role in a government airline bailout and links to jewelry discovered in a police raid on his office.<\/p>\n

It was Zapatero\u2019s first appearance before the National Court judge since being placed under investigation<\/a> last month for alleged influence peddling, money laundering and other possible financial wrongdoing related to the Spanish government\u2019s rescue of the Plus Ultra airline.<\/p>\n

Zapatero, 65, who was prime minister from 2004 to 2011, had been out of public office for a decade when Plus Ultra received 53 million euros ($61.5 million) in public money in 2021 from a COVID-19 recovery fund.<\/p>\n

Judge Jos\u00e9 Luis Calama is also examining a possible case of tax fraud and dealing in contraband related to jewelry worth 1.3 million euros ($1.5 million) discovered in a safe by police during a search of Zapatero\u2019s office in May.<\/p>\n

Zapatero has denied any wrongdoing in the airline case and has said the jewelry was inherited or received as gifts.<\/p>\n

Zapatero remains an important figure for the Socialist party led by current Prime Minister Pedro S\u00e1nchez<\/a>, whose party has been rocked by corruption scandals<\/a> over the past two years.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\"Spain's<\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

Plus Ultra, which had investors from Venezuela, was an airline specializing in flights between Spain and South America.<\/p>\n

Since leaving office, Zapatero has focused on maintaining dialogue with the government in Venezuela, which was largely isolated from Western countries after it cracked down on the democratic opposition.<\/p>\n

In a statement released to local media, Zapatero on Wednesday again denied any wrongdoing. He said he has no wealth outside Spain and he trusted the justice system.<\/p>\n

\u201cI have been accused of serious crimes that I did not commit,\u201d his statement read. \u201cI have always acted with decency and honor, and now I am faced with the task of demonstrating it.\u201d<\/p>\n

After listening to Zapatero for two-and-a-half hours, the judge rejected requests by state prosecutors to confiscate his passport, arguing that the former prime minister was neither a flight risk nor a threat to destroy evidence.<\/p>\n

In Spain, an investigative judge probes suspicions of a crime and can recommend a case go to trial if there is sufficient evidence. A different judge then oversees the trial phase. The process can take months or longer.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"BARCELONA, Spain (AP) \u2014 Jos\u00e9 Luis Rodr\u00edguez Zapatero, the former prime minister of Spain, appeared before a judge…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":42030,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[2883,1220,19502,15161,82,6953,205,24,15162,5689,17,913,564,394],"class_list":["post-42029","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-spain","tag-corruption","tag-general-news","tag-jos-luis-calama","tag-jos-luis-rodrguez-zapatero","tag-madrid","tag-money-laundering","tag-pedro-sanchez","tag-politics","tag-scandals","tag-socialism","tag-spain","tag-spain-government","tag-venezuela","tag-world-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42029","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=42029"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42029\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/42030"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=42029"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=42029"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=42029"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}