Do you remember the letter I posted a few days ago sent by 530 priests to the Pope?
Well, there has been a reaction to it, but not from The Vatican but from people that parade themselves as philosophers, to name a few: Günther Grass, Nadine Gordimer and Fernando Savater.
We are aware of the open hatred that Savater feels against Euskal Herria and the Basques people, but to get a German like Günther Grass to say the things you read in the document is testament to what the bias in the press can achieve.
Each one of those "prominent writers" decided to stomp all over the right of the nations without state to their self determination. They celebrate that Batasuna has been banned without questioning why Madrid has not presented a single piece of evidence to support its preposterous accusation that it is ETA's political wing. Even more, they celebrate that Batasuna has been listed as a terrorist organization by the USA as a reward to Aznar's full support of the war in Iraq, a war in which dozens of thousands of innocent civilians have been killed for the sole purpose of improving the oil profits for George W. Bush's close collaborators.
This lame article, writen with a lot of venom against the Basque people by someone called Emma Daly, appeared at the New York Times:
I declare that Günther Grass and Nadine Gordimer are Fascist apologists and that they condone Francisco Franco for all the crimes committed by his regime from 1936 through 1975, including all the Jewish families that Melitón Manzanas turned in to the Gestapo.
Give me a day or two so I can truly digest this article.
Well, there has been a reaction to it, but not from The Vatican but from people that parade themselves as philosophers, to name a few: Günther Grass, Nadine Gordimer and Fernando Savater.
We are aware of the open hatred that Savater feels against Euskal Herria and the Basques people, but to get a German like Günther Grass to say the things you read in the document is testament to what the bias in the press can achieve.
Each one of those "prominent writers" decided to stomp all over the right of the nations without state to their self determination. They celebrate that Batasuna has been banned without questioning why Madrid has not presented a single piece of evidence to support its preposterous accusation that it is ETA's political wing. Even more, they celebrate that Batasuna has been listed as a terrorist organization by the USA as a reward to Aznar's full support of the war in Iraq, a war in which dozens of thousands of innocent civilians have been killed for the sole purpose of improving the oil profits for George W. Bush's close collaborators.
This lame article, writen with a lot of venom against the Basque people by someone called Emma Daly, appeared at the New York Times:
Writers Sign Statement Denouncing Basque Nationalist Violence
By EMMA DALY
Published: May 8, 2003
More than a dozen prominent writers, including the Nobel laureates Nadine Gordimer and Günter Grass, have signed a strongly worded attack on Basque nationalist violence, which they say condemns citizens of the Basque region to live in fear.
''Although the memory of the Holocaust is honored in Europe,'' the statement said, ''few Europeans realize that today in the Basque country, free citizens are abused and murdered.''
The six-paragraph statement was published today in advance of regional elections on May 25, which are likely to show that voters remain split almost evenly between pro-independence and centrist parties.
The radical nationalist Batasuna party, allied to the violent separatist group E.T.A., has been banned from taking part in the election.
The United States added the party today to its list of international terrorist groups. The Spanish prime minister, José María Aznar, hailed Washington's decision, and implied it was a reward for Spain's support for the American-led war in Iraq.
Candidates representing Mr. Aznar's Popular Party, or the main opposition Socialist Party, face death threats and worse from supporters of E.T.A. More than a dozen local politicians have been killed by E.T.A. gunmen since the mid-1990's, and many more have been attacked by bombs or Molotov cocktails.
''Although it seems unbelievable, today the candidates among the free citizens of the Basque Country are condemned to death by the mercenaries of E.T.A. and condemned to humiliation by their nationalist accomplices,'' read the statement, addressed to Basta Ya! (Enough is Enough!), an antinationalist group created to oppose terrorism and support victims of terrorist violence.
Spain's Constitutional Court is set to rule this week on more than 400 appeals filed over its decision to ban another party with links to Batasuna, Autodeterminaziorako Bilgunea (AuB), from running in the elections. Legal nationalist parties oppose the party bans, and say they will help AuB to count its vote on May 25, even if ballots are legally void.
Fernando Savater, a Spanish writer and a leader of Basta Ya!, hailed the statement today as a sign that anti-nationalists are making their voice heard abroad.
''What is important to us this time is that the majority of those signing the declaration are foreigners, so there is a sense of internationalizing the situation,'' he said. ''Perhaps there is more sensitivity to the issue of terrorism after Sept. 11, but we are managing to make ourselves heard more.''
Mr. Aznar, who escaped an E.T.A. assassination attempt in 1995, has pursued a tough campaign against Basque nationalists, cracking down not only on E.T.A. but also on groups like Batasuna that the government says provide logistical, financial and moral support to terrorists.
Antinationalists, and the writers of the declaration today, also blame the nonviolent Basque Nationalist Party, which runs the local government, its allies and other institutions for allowing intimidation and violence against nonnationalists.
''Although citizens of the Basque Country are murdered for their ideas, and thousands have been mutilated or disturbed, the attacks take place and are celebrated in a sorry atmosphere of moral impunity created by nationalist institutions and the Basque Catholic hierarchy,'' the statement read.
I declare that Günther Grass and Nadine Gordimer are Fascist apologists and that they condone Francisco Franco for all the crimes committed by his regime from 1936 through 1975, including all the Jewish families that Melitón Manzanas turned in to the Gestapo.
Give me a day or two so I can truly digest this article.
.... ... .
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