A former Catalan minister facing extradition to Spain has been released on bail after handing herself in at a Scottish police station and making a brief appearance in court.

Professor Clara Ponsati, the ex-Catalan education minister, is being sought by the authorities in Madrid on charges of "violent rebellion and misappropriation of public funds" over her role in Catalonia's controversial independence referendum last year.

She refutes the charges and is facing a protracted legal fight to resist the attempts to have her returned Spain.

Her lawyer says she views the charges - which could attract a jail term of up to 30 years - as "political persecution" and believes that her human rights cannot be guaranteed in Spain.

St Andrews-based Prof Ponsati, 61, attended a police station in Edinburgh voluntarily on Wednesday morning after she was made the subject of a European arrest warrant last week.