Publisher’s Note: Many of us here in the Green Mountains admire Switzerland’s canton model. Apparently, so do the Catalonian separatists. Former Catalan President Carles Puigdemont has just been detained in Germany – fascinating BBC news coverage here.

Free Catalonia, and bless our 2nd Vermont Republic!

GENEVA — Catalonia’s fugitive ex-president says that independence for the Spanish region is not the “only option” for resolving Spain’s worst political crisis in recent decades.

Carles Puigdemont says that a moderate alternative could be adopting Switzerland’s canton model, which presumably would give more self-rule to the already ample powers granted to Spain’s regions.

Puigdemont said that “‘is independence the only option?’ Not at all, there are others of course, and perhaps among them, the Swiss model is perhaps the most effective and the most attractive.”

Puigdemont was speaking at the University of Geneva where he attended a film festival and forum on human rights Sunday.