Partner of Spain's right-wing icon takes legal action against PM

The partner of the Madrid region's influential right-wing leader is suing Spain's Socialist premier Pedro Sanchez and a minister for calling him a "confessed criminal", legal sources said on Monday.

Businessman Alberto Gonzalez Amador is seeking 100,000 euros ($108,000) from Sanchez, 50,000 euros from Justice Minister Felix Bolanos and a retractation of the comments, his legal team told AFP.

Amador, the partner of Isabel Diaz Ayuso, believes Sanchez and Bolanos violated the "respect and protection of a Spanish citizen's basic rights", his team said, confirming a report by the daily El Mundo.

Investigators have been probing allegations of tax fraud against Amador since March after one of his companies offering health services saw its earnings soar during the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020 and 2021.

Spanish media said Amador offered a deal to prosecutors in which he would admit the alleged offences in exchange for avoiding a trial and receiving a sentence that would spare him jail.

Sanchez and Bolanos referred to Amador last week as "a confessed criminal who defrauded the treasury", in a case that has generated a media frenzy in Spain.

Ayuso, a figurehead for the Spanish right and an acerbic critic of Sanchez's left-wing governments since 2018, has said the affair is a "savage" campaign by the state against her.

In a separate decision on Monday, Spain's top criminal court threw out a complaint by Ayuso's conservative opposition Popular Party against the Socialists for alleged illegal financing.

The court said the complaint, based on a press report citing anonymous sources, did not justify opening criminal proceedings.