ETA warned it must renounce violence to have a say in region

Published on Friday 7 July 2006 01:59

THE Basque terrorist group ETA was told yesterday in an unprecedented meeting with Spain's ruling party that it must renounce violence to have any say over the region's future now that it has called a ceasefire.

"If until today they were part of the problem, we now want them to be part of the solution," Patxi Lopez, leader of the Basque branch of the governing Socialist party, said after talks with Arnaldo Otegi, the leader of Batasuna - the outlawed party seen as ETA's political wing.

Both sides hailed the meeting at a hotel in the Basque city of San Sebastian as a possible step toward ending the nearly 40-year-old conflict in which ETA has killed more than 800 people with a campaign of shootings and bombings.

The gathering marked the first time a representative of a governing party in Spain has conferred openly with a delegate of an outlawed party officially classified as part of a terrorist organisation. Previous governments held secret meetings with Batasuna or ETA that were disclosed only afterwards. Conservatives accused the prime minister, Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, of caving in to terrorists by condoning the meeting, which they called "immoral."

ETA declared what it called a permanent ceasefire in March and Mr Zapatero said last week he will negotiate with the group, having concluded the truce is sincere.

His announcement gave the go-ahead for the historic meeting with Batasuna, which is eager to take part in proposed talks among Basque parties on the future of the region. These would run in parallel to talks between ETA and the government on the status of ETA prisoners and terms for the group's formal dissolution.

Batasuna was banned by the Spanish supreme court in 2003 on grounds that it is part of ETA. The party denies this but has pointedly and repeatedly refused to condemn ETA's killings.

Mr Lopez said the 90-minute meeting was legal even though Batasuna is outlawed, and was designed to encourage the party to renounce violence and work toward lifting the ban, thus gaining entry into the multi-party talks.

Batasuna, he said, "is as necessary as the others to build this country through a common accord, but to do this they must be within the democratic system, not outside".

Mr Otegi, the most visible pro-independence politician in the Basque region, who once served jail time for taking part in an ETA kidnapping and faces several terrorism indictments, said his party had held secret contacts with the Socialist party for years.

These, he said, and Thursday's session now make it possible for Batasuna to envision "a historic and real opportunity to resolve the political conflict" in the Basque country.

He insisted that the Basque people have the right to decide their fate - independence or remaining part of Spain - but any accord on the region's future must be negotiated with Basques who prefer the status quo. In any case, the Spanish government must respect the outcome of such negotiations, Mr Otegi said.

Mariano Rajoy, the Conservative opposition leader, derided Mr Zapatero, saying he is yielding to terrorism by allowing contacts with Batasuna while it is still outlawed and before ETA has surrendered and dissolved.

"The meeting was held with a terrorist organisation which has neither condemned nor renounced criminal activity, and this makes the meeting especially immoral," Mr Rajoy told reporters yesterday.