The Spanish government has suspended all dialogues with Basque
separatist organization ETA following a car bomb attack by the
group in Madrid's Barajas airport, Prime Minister Jose Luis
Rodriguez Zapatero announced on Saturday.
Strongly condemning the incident, Zapatero said the act of
violence ran counter to a permanent truce declared by ETA in
March.
Describing the attack as an erroneous step taken by ETA, the
premier stressed that "they will get nothing except to inflict
pain."
So long as ETA refused to unequivocally renounce violence, the
Spanish government would not conduct any dialogue with it, he
emphasized, reiterating that the fight by the Spanish government
and people against ETA would be "long and arduous."
Earlier on Saturday, Mariano Rajoy of Spain's main opposition
party Popular Party (PP) issued a statement demanding the
government immediately stop all contacts with ETA since the group
"does not have any aspiration for peace."
On Saturday morning a car bombing occurred in a parking lot of
the Barajas airport, leaving two people missing and 19 others
injured. The blast seriously damaged the parking lot and caused a
brief disruption of the airport's operation. ETA claimed
responsibility for the attack in one of three early morning
anonymous telephone calls.
ETA, the abbreviation for Basque Homeland and Freedom which was
created in 1959, has called for the establishment of an independent
Basque state in the Basque region straddling the Spanish-French
border.
Over the past four decades, assassinations, kidnappings and
explosions carried out by the group have claimed the lives of
nearly 1,000 people. The European Union and the United States have
listed ETA as a terrorist organization.
ETA declared a permanent truce on March 22. Three months later,
the Spanish government decided to start a dialogue with the
group.
(Xinhua News Agency December 31, 2006)
