Holly Inquisition in Action

And so it happened that today the trial began.

A total of 56 Basques stand accused of being the external network that provides ETA with funds, safe houses and legal presence within the Basque community.

To be honest, Madrid seems to think that any Basque that stands for the self-determination of Euskal Herria is an apologist of terrorism. In doing so, Madrid attacks every single individual or group with the same exact blanket accusation, being members of the entorno.

It was weird to see so many news outlets reporting this trial, then again, since it is up to lazy editors, the only time when the Basques exist is when you can link them to violence.

Here you have what EITb publised today:

Trial against Basque left-wing organizations begins

Fifty nine people went on trial Monday on charges of directing the logistical side of the armed Basque group ETA's, raising funds, forging passports and helping commandos communicate with one another.

The trial began with a court clerk reading out the indictment. Defence lawyers then asked for the case to be suspended on the grounds that the documentation was not complete. The defendants have not yet entered a plea.

The trial is the largest ever in terms of the number of defendants to go before the National Court, the Spanish tribunal that deals with affairs of state and terrorism cases.

The case stems from an eight-year probe by Baltasar Garzon, Spain's leading anti-terror investigator.

Some of the defendants showed an unofficial Basque identity card instead of the official Spanish one as they entered the court. Most wore grey T-Shirts that read in Basque "For civil and political rights" and the number of the case file, 18/98, crossed out.

The trial, which is to hear testimony from more than 300 people, is being held under tight security at a trade fair pavilion. The normal venue for such proceedings would be the National Court, but it is too small for a trial with so many defendants, lawyers and reporters. The site was used earlier this year for Europe's first major trial of suspected al-Qaida members.

Five months

Those on trial include alleged members of Basque youth groups and other organizations and businesses that portrayed themselves as coordinators of pro-independence activities but were banned by Garzon on grounds they were a front for fund-raising and other support for ETA. The trial is to last up to five months.

These groups were the "stomach, heart and head" of ETA, prosecutor Jesus Santos said last week. The accused are charged with crimes ranging from membership in or collaboration with a terrorist organization to tax violations, and each is facing a sentence varying from 10 to 51 years in jail.

Basque nationalists say the trial can only hinder prospects for peace, and consider it a byproduct of the previous conservative government which was in power when the probe began.

And Gara:

Defendants claim trial is political and refuse to answer questions from the prosecution

MADRID

Askasibar refused to answer the questions of both the public prosecutor and the private accusations from a right-wing pressure group called AVT (the Association of Victims of Terrorism), saying he would only respond to the defence attorneys' questions.

The public prosecutor, who is asking the court to sentence this defendant to 15 years in prison for what Spanish law calls 'membership of an armed organisation', nevertheless proceeded to read out his list of 94 questions for Askasibar.

Defence lawyers asked for a delay of the hearing until formal irregularities in the proceedings had been corrected and all the documentary evidence was present in the courtroom. But the court overruled these objections and ordered the trial to proceed.

At the end of the morning session, the court was adjourned until this afternoon.

Coaches

It was nearly 10:30 a.m. when the first day of trial began in the Third Section of the Criminal Court, in the 'Audiencia Nacional'. This is the court in Madrid that deals with cases that cannot be dealt with at a local level.

Shortly earlier, the defendants, 59 in number, arrived from Euskal Herria in several coaches, in the company of their friends, family and a large number of Basque public personalities, all of whom had come to give the accusees their support.

Joxe Mari Olarra, the first of the accused to go through security at Casa de Campo, where the massive trial is to take place, showed his Euskal Herria Identity Card (EHNA) for identification. Since this is not officially recognised, police used Olarra's police file as a form of identification, and allowed him to proceed to the courtroom.

That procedure was repeated for each of the defendants, one by one. Every defendant wore a similar shirt bearing words proclaiming: '18/98: Support civil and political rights!'

The 18/98+ Platform, which was organised in the Basque Country to support those charged in this political witch hunt and to raise public awareness on the issue, had planned a press conference this morning in front of the courthouse, but the Spanish police prevented it from going ahead. But eventually the press conference did take place.

Members of the platform declared that the trial is legally 'untenable'. They also announced simultaneous demonstrations of protest this Saturday in five major Basque cities.

'This trial should never have started. It is nonsense,' said Roberto Etxezarreta, spokesman for the 18/98+ group. 'The right thing to do, in these new times when a more receptive disposition has been announced by the Spanish government, if there is any real intention to usher in a more democratic period following the dark era of Aznar's government, would be simply to declare the case closed.'

'We call for the discontinuation of these trials in the belief that they imply a violation of basic rights and a collective attack on Basques who defend their people's right to defend their future,' he said.

Of the numerous representatives of Basque political, social and trade-union organisations who accompanied the families and friends of the accused to Madrid to show their solidarity, many were unable to get in to the Casa de Campo courtroom owing to the lack of space.

Now, most of the news paper that are all too happy to repeat whatever press release sent to them by one of the big news outlet printed something like this: "56 Go On Trial in Spain in ETA Case" or "Trial Begings Against Alleged ETA Support Groups".

They are not telling the entire truth, they are not ready to compromise, but at least they sort of differentiate the 56 from ETA, as it should be, because in democracies, he who stands accused of a crime is innocent until proven guilty.

But then there is those on Madrid's payroll, those are the ones that printed article titles like these:

Euronews.net (France): Biggest trial ever against ETA opens in Madrid

United Press International: ETA super-trial opens in Spain

Sydney Morning Herald (Australia): Spain opens ETA support networks trial

But then, the exception to the rule, the one that gave Garzòn, Aznar and even Bush a reason to go to bed mad:

International Herald Tribune: With trial, Spain widens terror breadth

Kudos to IHT for not going for the lazy kind of journalism done by some many around the world.

May justice be done, as it should be.

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