Mr Puigdemont was rumoured to be planning to call an election in the wake of the crisis sparked by the independence referendum.
He also failed to declare independence from the rest of Spain and create a new republic.
The move will anger some hardline separatists who had been pushing for the region’s leader to formally declare indpendence in defiance of the central government in Madrid.
It had been widely expected that Mr Puigdemont would call snap regional elections as a way of preventing Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy from implementing Article 155 and seizing control of the semi-autonomous region.
More to follow…