Zapatero, to his secretary, in July 2025: "I can't do English, I'm tangled up with Junts"

MadridThe investigation by the Audiencia Nacional into José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero is revealing the movements of the former Spanish president in recent years. L'ARA has gained access to his 2024 and 2025 diaries and to the WhatsApp conversations he had with his secretary, Gertrudis Alcázar, between April 2025 and the day of his indictment. "Cancel my run?", she asked him that morning. "Yes, of course", he answered her immediately afterwards. There are messages in which both speak directly about Junts. "I can't do English, mess with Junts", Zapatero told him on July 21, 2025. The next day there was the last plenary session of Congress of the political year and Junts voted against the anti-shutdown decree, which also derailed with the rejection of Podem, and against the advance payments, which Moncloa saved thanks to the approval of the PP.

Zapatero's 2024 and 2025 diaries document his relationship with Junts and also his personal life, such as when he goes to the dentist or hairdresser. Although not everything is related to the case, the police have included the two documents in the summary and they have ended up being leaked. "It is an unprecedented scandal that the diaries and private conversations of a president are published", assure sources close to the former president, adding that they are considering legal action. The PSOE has also criticized that it is a "witch hunt incompatible with the guarantees that a democracy demands" and sources from Moncloa have expressed "concern" about this type of leak.

What do these annotations show? They reveal Zapatero's participation in the international mediation process with Junts, in Zurich, with the Salvadoran mediator Francisco Galindo. They also allow us to deduce the moments of tension in this relationship, for example, in January 2024 with the negotiation of the amnesty law or in the summer of 2025, when Junts issued an ultimatum to the Spanish government which was conveyed in a very tough meeting with Zapatero in Switzerland.

One of the critical moments in the early stages of the legislature was in January 2024, when Junts rejected the first draft of the amnesty to force the PSOE and Esquerra to renegotiate the text. The agenda shows contacts with both Carles Puigdemont's party and with Moncloa, specifically with minister Félix Bolaños, who was leading the negotiation, and with Santos Cerdán, who at that time was Junts' main interlocutor. Thus, on January 19th Zapatero had dinner with Cerdán, on January 22nd he had breakfast with Bolaños, that same weekend he met with Junts in Zurich, and the next day he had another meeting at Moncloa. However, the dialogue did not bear fruit.

The crisis with Puigdemont

The agendas also reflect a key moment with Junts: August 2025. A year after having invested Sánchez and with the Cerdán case already at the forefront, Zapatero became the sole interlocutor for Junts at the table in Switzerland, along with Juan Francisco Serrano, a PSOE deputy in Congress and former right-hand man of Cerdán. On August 28 and 29, there was a negotiation session in Zurich in which Junts delivered an ultimatum. They asked for specifics on the open issues: the transfer of powers in immigration, Catalan in the European Union, the publication of fiscal balances, or the application of amnesty – with the acceptance of precautionary measures by the Constitutional Court on the table. Previously, Zapatero had met with the Spanish president, Pedro Sánchez, and the President of the Generalitat, Salvador Illa, along with Minister Ángel Víctor Torres, at a dinner in Barcelona.

Another thing that is confirmed in the agenda is that Zapatero also saw Illa often. He appears a total of eight times. During the last few years, Sánchez, the leader of the PSC, and the former Spanish president have formed an aligned ideological triangle with a roadmap in favor of the plurinational majority. Bolaños has the most significant interaction: his name appears about twenty times.

Zapatero's mediation with Junts, however, did not bear fruit, not even in the meetings of October 13 and 14 in Zurich, since on the 27th Junts formalized the break with the PSOE: "They may have the power, but they cannot rule", Puigdemont said that day.

A week after this break, on November 4, Zapatero sent his secretary a Word document with the "pending matters" according to the joiners. Eight and a half hours later, she sent him a document titled PSOE-Junts Report, which was the latest version and contained the corrections that Juan Francisco Serrano had made.

The next morning, both met at Congress. "It brings back memories for me," Zapatero confessed. On November 20, the former Spanish president also asked for changes to the agenda: "I will not be able to have this afternoon's meetings. Puigdemont," he wrote. It is not specified whether he called the leader of Junts, met with him, wrote to him, or if there was simply a problem with the Junts members. A sign, in any case, of a last attempt to mend the relationship with Puigdemont's party.

"I liked Leire"

Zapatero also spoke with his secretary about Leire Díez. On June 4, the day the PSOE's plumber held a press conference to defend herself, which was overshadowed by the appearance of Víctor de Aldama, the former Spanish president celebrated her explanations: "I liked Leire," he said. Five months later, coinciding with Leire Díez's declaration in the courts of Plaza de Castilla as an investigated party, he arranged a meeting with her. “She should be here at the office because Leire is active in Ferraz. She can come a little earlier,” his secretary told him. Initially, it was supposed to be on Friday, November 21, but it was eventually postponed.

An "acid season ahead" after the arrest of Julio Martínez

The messages exchanged between Zapatero and his secretary in December 2025 also highlight Zapatero's reaction after the arrest of Julio Martínez Martínez, a friend of his for many years. "We have to assume we have an acid season ahead. All three reacted better than expected, you never fully know human beings," he lamented. "I still can't believe it... It's like a heart attack, it doesn't warn and bam. Imagine the bodyguards, with the relationship they had with him," Zapatero added later.

And in the following days, he began to ask for details about his activity related to Análisis Relevante, Julio Martínez's company. "When was the first invoice issued?" he asked. It was from June 24, 2020. "See how many trips I made to Venezuela from 2020 to 2025," he asked the next day. A total of eight, of which three are related to electoral processes. He also wanted to know "what percentage of income tax" applied to him and the trips he had made since 2020 with the "details" of the invoiced activities, as well as the percentage of income that the payments from Análisis Relevante represented in the last ten years. He also instructed him to confirm to journalists that he did "absolutely no dealings with anyone" and that he has a "long-standing friendship" with Julio Martínez.