http://www.isn.ethz.ch/news/sw/details.cfm?id=11507
ETA announces partial ceasefire ETA logo (ISN) ISN ISN SECURITY WATCH (20/06/05) - The Basque separatist group ETA on Saturday said it would implement a partial ceasefire and vowed to halt attacks on Spain's elected officials, local media reported. The Basque daily Gara newspaper said it had received a communiqué from ETA saying that, as of 1 June, the group had closed "the front against elected officials from Spain's political parties". Spain's political parties, with the exception of the Communist Party of the Basque Lands, rejected the ETA statement. ETA said its decision to implement a partial ceasefire was based on recent political changes, including the fact that the Spanish government did not heed calls to outlaw the Basque Communist party, which won nine seats in Basque's April elections, partially due to the quiet backing of the Batasuna party - the banned political party linked to ETA. The group has not vowed to disarm, but said it intended to keep up its armed struggle until Spain acknowledged Basques' right to self-determination. Spanish officials shrugged off the ETA's ceasefire announcement, calling it discrimination. "The only letter that the government will comment on is the one that announces that ETA stops killing, stops extorting, and that it will disappear," Deputy Prime Minister María Teresa Fernandez told a press conference. In mid-May, Spanish parliament gave the government the green light to begin a dialog with ETA to end more than three decades of violence on the condition that the group promised to lay down its arms. The move was initiated by Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Zapatero, who said the resolution would not involve concessions to ETA in its struggle for Basque independence, but would focus on disbandment terms and the fate of more than 500 ETA members being held in Spanish prisons. ETA is blamed for more than 800 killings since 1968. It wants an independent Basque homeland in an area that would include parts of northern Spain and southwestern France. In September 1998, ETA called a ceasefire, which lasted until December 1999. Over the past two years, the separatist group has carried out several small attacks that resulted in zero casualties. In the letter sent to the Basque daily, ETA claimed responsibility for an attack on the Zaragoza airport last week, a car bomb attack in Madrid that injured 52 people, and attack on the mausoleum of former dictator Francisco Franco in May. The EU and the US have labeled ETA a terrorist organization. (By Anes Alic in Sarajevo) -------------------------- Want to discuss this topic? Head on over to our discussion list, [EMAIL PROTECTED] -------------------------- Brooks Isoldi, editor [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.intellnet.org Post message: osint@yahoogroups.com Subscribe: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe: [EMAIL PROTECTED] *** FAIR USE NOTICE. This message contains copyrighted material whose use has not been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. OSINT, as a part of The Intelligence Network, is making it available without profit to OSINT YahooGroups members who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information in their efforts to advance the understanding of intelligence and law enforcement organizations, their activities, methods, techniques, human rights, civil liberties, social justice and other intelligence related issues, for non-profit research and educational purposes only. We believe that this constitutes a 'fair use' of the copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the U.S. Copyright Law. If you wish to use this copyrighted material for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use,' you must obtain permission from the copyright owner. For more information go to: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/osint/ <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
