Vital Juan Carlos, ex-king of Spain who has been in exile for two years, will return to his country on Thursday, the royal family announced on Wednesday.
Former King of Spain Juan Carlos I, who went into exile in the United Arab Emirates in August 2020 on suspicion of embezzlement, will return to his country for the first time on Thursday for a brief visit, the Royal Palace said on Wednesday.
The former monarch “shared his decision to travel to Spain from tomorrow to Monday 23 May,” the palace said in a press release, while investigations into him in Spain were dropped in March.
Juan Carlos will first travel to Sanxenxo in Galicia (north-west) before traveling to Madrid on Monday to visit his son King Felipe VI, his wife Sofia and other family members. He will leave “on the same day” for Abu Dhabi “where he has established his permanent and stable residence,” the palace said. This visit falls within the framework of “His Majesty Juan Carlos’s desire to travel regularly to Spain to visit his family and friends” in a “private” setting, while the palace’s press release excludes the possibility that the former monarch may be staying in Spain an official palace have drawn criticism in the country.
Three investigations were closed with no follow-up
Juan Carlos, a central figure in the democratic transition after the death of dictator Franco in 1975, who abdicated in 2014 amid scandals, left Spain for Abu Dhabi in August 2020 after increasingly compromising revelations about his life journey and the murky origins of his fortune had . He then explained that he wished to “facilitate” his son Felipe VI’s “exercise” of his functions in view of “the public consequences of certain past events in (his) private life”.
The three investigations against him in Spain were finally dropped in early March, paving the way for his potential return to Spain. Even before the exile of Juan Carlos, Felipe VI. decided in March 2020 to forego his father’s inheritance and deprive him of his annual pocket money of almost 200,000 euros.