British expat arrested in Spain over attempt to ASSASSINATE politician
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Alejo Vidal-Quadras, founder of the Vox party, was shot earlier this month
A British woman has been arrested in connection with a botched assassination of a politician in Madrid.
Alejo Vidal-Quadras was shot in the face in central Madrid on November 9, after which his attackers fled the scene on a motorbike.
The woman, who has not been named, is the partner of one of two other suspects arrested earlier this morning.
The arrests took place in Fuengirola and Lanjarón in the southern Andalusia region.
Municipal police officers in the area where the former leader of the Popular Party of Catalonia and co-founder of Vox, Alejo Vidal-Quadras was shot
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Sources quoted by various Spanish news outlets said that police have confirmed a so-called “Iranian trail”.
This points to the attack taking place because of the victim’s relationship with Iranian dissidents.
The detained man in Fuengirola is alleged to be directly related to the attack, while the woman’s alleged degree of involvement is still unknown.
The shooting took place at about 1.30pm on November 9 when Vidal-Quadras was walking to his home in central Madrid.
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Officers attended the scene in Central Madrid
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Eyewitnesses said that a person wearing a black motorcycle helmet, a blue coat and jeans approached the politician on foot.
When he was a metre away, fired a bullet at point-blank range which pierced his face near the jaw.
While the politician was attended to by a witness, the gunman ran towards a motorcycle that was parked near by where a second person was waiting for him and they fled the scene.
Vidal-Quadras is the former head of the conservative Popular Party in the Catalonia region and founder of the Vox party.
Alejo Vidal-Quadras was shot in Madrid, Spain
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The motorbike was discovered later abandoned and burnt out in a Madrid suburb.
Officers managed to recover its vehicle identification number from the scene.
This the investigating officers to a French person wanted in Paris for an alleged murder, according to El País newspaper.
Images recorded by security cameras in commercial establishments near the crime scene also aided officers.