Pictures From The Unified Aberri Eguna

Here you have some pictures sent to me from Hazparne that show the unified Aberri Eguna celebration in the Hegoalde-Iparralde border:

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Irish Basque Bash

Check this out:

The Belfast Basque Committee is organising the IV IRISH-BASQUE NIGHT next Good Friday, 6th of April

From 8.30pm at Conway Mill, Lower Falls Road, you will find Basque traditional musicians, Irish and Basque DJ's playing ska, reggae and Basque mixes, patxaran, t-shirts, video screenings...and many more surprises.

Previous editions have been a huge success. We ask everybody to come early to avoid disappointment as it always gets packed.

Tickets: £5 before 10pm / £8 after 10pm.
Bring your own.

Keep up to date on the Basque struggle at: www.irishbasquecommittees.blogspot.com

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Glimpses of Euskal Herria

Here you have a nice documentary about Euskal Herria:

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Women and the Korrika

This article comes to us via EITb:

15th edition of race to boost Basque language officially presented

The event will pay tribute to Basque women in this edition, trying to underline the importance and the essential role women play in transmitting the Basque language.

Korrika, the race in favor of the Basque language that kicks off every two years, was presented Thursday (March 15) at the headquarters of the Royal Academy of the Basque language (Euskaltzaindia) in Bilbao.

Different cultural and social agents attended the official presentation of the event and watched the Korrika 15 video.

This time "Korrika" pays tribute to the Basque women, underlining the importance and the essential role women play in transmitting the Basque language.

All over different periods, it has been women who have struggled against the laws contrary to the Basque language, with great strength and courage, and it has been them who have kept, maintained and transmitted the language orally in Basque homes.

This year the race will last 11 days and will go from Karrantza harana/Valle de Carranza to Pamplona/Iruña. More than 600,000 people are expected to participate, as in previous editions. The race will kick off on March 22.

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Roman Site in Euskal Herria

This archeology related article comes to us via EITb:

Knowing the "Roman-Basque" capital town

This settlement, formerly considered as an ‘oppidum’, a fortified military camp, is the most important Roman settlement among the ones found in Álava.

The Roman town of Iruña-Veleia is an archaeological site located in the municipality of Iruña de Oca, between the localities of Trespuentes and Villodas, and ten kilometres from Vitoria-Gasteiz. The experts continue working in this place.

This settlement, formerly considered as an ‘oppidum’, a fortified military camp, is the most important Roman settlement among the ones found in Álava. New findings indicate that this was the main centre of consumption in the Basque Country during the Roman period.

As it was located in the main overland route of the North of the Iberian Peninsula, it played a very important role in the revitalisation of the environment, since it distributed all the goods (oil, wine, salted meats, marble, crockery…) that arrived at there.

Therefore, these are the remains of a town strictly speaking, integrated into a completely Romanised area, whose origins go back to the end of the Bronze Age. During the Iron Age, it experienced a great expansion and the end of the 1st century of our time was its golden age. During that period, they replaced their huts with houses, including rooms around a central courtyard with a water cistern.

The access to the site –covering more than 1,500 years of history- is located at what formerly was the southern gate of the wall. This wall sheltered an urban area of more than 11 hectares but, nowadays, we can only see 500 metres.

Once we get in, leaving the Cardo Maximus to our left, we find several rooms belonging to a big urban residence, opened to a secondary street. Very close to it, we can enjoy impressive mosaics that, at present, are put in their original place. We can see the remains of painting coatings and the mosaic floor –dating from the 3rd century AD-. It also preserves the overflow channel of the water tank.

A bit farther, very near the town’s main street, that is, the Cardo Maximus, we find the remains of a house in which we can see the cellar. At the highest part of the town, we can observe the remains of a big public building that was integrated into the wall as a tower. The wall was built between the 3rd and 4th centuries AD, it had a 1.5 kilometre perimeter and very high towers (some points of the wall preserve more than nine metres).

To get an idea of how life was in the old town, a small exhibition of photographs, texts, and drawings has been installed. Some of the pieces found in the excavations are in the Museum of Archaeology of Álava, a visit recommended by the project Iruña-Veleia 3rd Millennium.

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The Holly Inquisition Today

Well, here you have hard evidence that The Vatican is a backwards institution that belongs in the Middle Ages. This note comes to us via EITb:

Vatican to suspend Basque theologian Jon Sobrino

He is charged with distorting the image of the historical Jesus. The well-known Jesuit, one of greatest exponents of the Liberation Theology, will not be allowed to teach or to publish books.

Jon Sobrino, renowned theologian and one of the leaders of the Liberation Theology, will be punished by Vatican's Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Spain's El Mundo newspaper reports Friday.

According to El Mundo, the Vatican charges Sobrino with "not stating openly the divine conscience of the historical Jesus, this is, putting too much stress on the humanity of Christ hiding its divinity.

The Congregation will ban Sobrino from teaching in Church centres and from publishing books. The punishment will be announced within the next days, although the Spanish newspaper says it might be next March 15. It adds Sobrino and the Jesuit Order already know about the sanction.

The same sources say the Vatican asked Sobrino to correct its attitude. The Basque theologian asked his superiors for advice and he was told he would be backed no matter which his decision was. He decided not to rectify and the Vatican continued the proceedings.

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70 Years Ago

The memory of this naval battle will be cherished for always by the Basques for it represents the will of an entire nation to prevail over its enemies in its quest for self determination. Here you have the note published by EiTB:

70th anniversary of the Matxitxako naval battle

The Basque President will chair the ceremony in tribute to the dead Basque sailors in this Spanish Civil War's battle.

March 4th marks the 70th anniversary of the Matxitxako naval battle, a tragic battle at the Spanish Civil War that left dozens of dead people. A ceremony chaired by the Basque President Juan José Ibarretxe, a flower offering within the sea and a meeting with the survivors will commemorate the naval battle.

Merchant ship Galdames was scheduled to leave the port of Baiona for Bilbao 5 March 1937, carrying several tons of coins minted in Belgium. The Mar Cantábrico, a merchant ship bringing weapons from Mexico, was also expected on the Basque coast that day.

Franco's troops, warned about the importance of the cargo, mobilized its troops. It was extremely important that the two cargoes did not reach the port.

The Basque authorities, as a precautionary measure, sent four former cod-fishing trawlers restructured into warships to protect the two Basque merchant ships. The nationalist troops sent the cruiser Canarias, the most powerful warship in Franco's navy.

The Canarias begun a fierce battle against the Basque ships which ended with the death of dozens of Basque sailors.

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Basque Refugee Children in Leeds

On an effort to provide safe haven for the children due to the imminent danger created by the genocidal war unleashed by the Spaniards with the support of Adolph Hitler and Benito Mussolini, a number of countries decided to aid the Basques. Thanks to the Yorkshire Evening Post we learned about one of the many stories of how some Basque children were spared from the ethnic cleansing campaign led by Francisco Franco:

Children of war at work and play

John Thorpe

It was Eric Drummond of Syke Lane in Scarcroft who urged us not to forget how Leeds helped to house 30 Basque children during the Spanish Civil War.

They were given a home on Hill End Road, Armley, and their home was also their school.

Eric, then a 12-year-old who had a newspaper round that included the street on which they lived, remembers them being slightly mischievous. And Eric's wife's grandmother was caretaker at the house of the Basque children.

The Basque children would "take" Eric's bike for a ride while he delivered newspapers to the houses but it was always returned.

Raymond Hardcastle of Langton Green in West Leeds was an eight-year-old when the Basque children were evacuated to Leeds. He is another who remembers them.

"We used to walk up the long fields from the Green Thorpe Estate passing all the tusky fields," Raymond tells me.

"The path then ran along the railway to a bridge over the tracks which led to the path that ran alongside West Leeds High School playing fields.

"The house where the children stayed was a mansion-type place with a big courtyard. There was a small wall dividing the path and the courtyard where the Basque children played. We'd climb on to the wall and throw a ball down in to the courtyard and the children would throw it back.

"Sometimes we'd throw down sweets but not very often because these were in short supply.

"A lady used to come out of the house and into the yard and 'shoo' all the children inside and tell us to go away but we used to go back just the same. Then one day when we went there were no children playing in the yard and we were told they'd all moved. I've often wondered what happened to the Basque children and if life got better for them.

"And after reading Eric's account of the children I now wonder if the lady who told us to go away was indeed Eric's wife's grandmother?"

Now the snap of the Basque children were taken by Sydney Long's father. Says Sydney from his Harrogate home: "I presume the 'lads' are working on their allotment.

"I believe they were housed in the building with the tall chimney stack at the back. I would be about the same age as the Basque children when my father took these pictures."

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Iruñea's Proposal

This note was published at EiTB:

Batasuna present proposal to thousands of supporters in Iruña

Arnaldo Otegi presented his national approach including two proposals: one addressed to the French government about Iparralde and another addressed to the Spanish government about Hegoalde.

The Basque left nationalist movement presented on Saturday in the Basque town of Pamplona-Iruña (Navarre) their proposal for a "democratic framework for the Basque Country," during a meeting in which Batasuna's spokesman Arnaldo Otegi assured that "the final objective is to get – through agreement and negotiation – a Basque State, socialist and Basque speaking."

The meeting took place in the Anaitasuna Pavilion, full to bursting, and counted on the presence of important leaders of the outlawed Basque nationalist party Batasuna such as Arnaldo Otegi, Pernando Barrena and Juan Kruz Aldasoro, or Basque nationalist union leader Rafa Diez.

Otegi asked Spain's president Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero to act with "political responsibility and historical ambition" to negotiate the autonomy proposal for Navarre and the Basque Country, and highlighted this is "the only reasonable alternative" for the "political conflict."

He also said the proposal for the creation of a new political region comprising Navarre and the Basque Country within the Spanish State is "the first step towards the national reconstruction and the path towards independence." He considered Navarre as "the Basque Country’s pillar." "Without Navarre we can't do anything," he added.

The proposal, recently announced by the pro-independent movement, includes the creation of one political region formed by the Basque Autonomous Region (Bizkaia, Gipuzkoa, Alava) and Navarre and another political region formed by the three Basque provinces of Iparralde (northern part of the Basque Country, situated within the French State), and a plan for the solution of the conflict through self-determination.

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A New Euskal Herria

A child holds a Basque flag with a sticker reading 'A new Basque Country', during a Batasuna rally in Pamplona, in the Spanish Basque province of Navarra, March 3, 2007. Spokesman for the banned Basque party, Arnaldo Otegi, proposed an initial four-province Basque region comprised of Navarra and the three provinces of the Basque Autonomous Community, with the right to statehood, saying that, without Navarra, they wanted 'Nothing, nothing, nothing.' REUTERS/Vincent West (SPAIN)

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