Sunday, October 18, 2009
Wednesday, October 14, 2009
Blockade and Political Apartheid
We just received this communique from the Irish Basque Committees:
The Spanish government tries to blockade a new political initiative arresting 10 prominent Basque pro-independence activists
Less than two months after the Spanish Interior Minister’s threats against the Basque pro-independence left’s new political proposals last evening 10 people were arrested in Donostia/San Sebastian. All of them are prominent Basque pro-independence activists like Batasuna’s spokesperson Arnaldo Otegi and former LAB trade union leader Rafa Diez. Another one, Rufi Etxebarria, had been released from jail just one week ago after spending two years in prison for being a member of the outlawed Batasuna party.
Five of them were arrested in the LAB trade union’s offices and the others in different places around the country. All of them are being accused by the Spanish authorities and pro-Spanish media of reorganising the Basque pro-independence left’s leadership.
While some sort of repressive action was expected after weeks of strong Spanish criminalization and pressure the arrestes have shocked and outraged the majority of Basque society. Several political parties and the main trade unions have already spoken out against the police operation. According to them the arrests are political and are directed at preventing any new political initiative by the pro-independence left to bring the Basque Country to a scenario of peace and democracy.
It’s been publicly known that the Basque pro-independence left has been involved in a deep strategic debate for the last few months. At the same time discussions have been held with other progressive and pro-independence parties, trade unions and social organizations in order to form a strong pro-self-determination front.
Over the last 13 years every time the pro-independence left has taken a new political step the Spanish authorities have responded with police operations. Batasuna’s spokesperson Arnaldo Otegi is a good example of it as he has been arrested and imprisoned on numerous ocasions for his political work. Just last week he was told he will be tried for the so called “Anoeta event” in 2004 when himself and other Basque pro-independence movement representatives launched a peace proposal in front of 15,000 people. The proposal was widely accepted and set the way for dialogue and resolution which led to the 2005 negotiations between ETA and the Spanish government and ETA’s 2006 ceasefire.
Despite the attacks the Spanish authorities haven’t been able to stop the Basque pro-independence left’s political initiative and strength. Arnaldo Otegi quoting father Alec Reid has repeated on many ocasions that “the more reasonable our proposals are the more they’ll persecute us”.
Since 2002 the Basque left has had to organise in the most difficult conditions, mainly underground due to the Spanish authorities continuous criminalisation policies. However the pro-independence movement has always kept a public profile refusing to be silenced.
At a conference in Bilbao last week United Nations Human Rights and Counter-Terrorism Special Rapporteur Martin Scheinin warned that cutting off the political ways is extremely dangerous.
As has happened in previous repressive attacks the Basque pro-independence left has also declared today: “Against more repression we’ll respond with more political initiative".
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A Reckless Farce
Last night, once again, the Spanish police arrested prominent Basque pro-independence leaders and activists: Arnaldo Otegi, Rufi Etxeberria, Rafa Díez, Arkaitz Rodríguez, Sonia Jacinto, Miren Zabaleta, Mañel Serra, Txelui Moreno and Amaia Esnal. Once again, a reckless and short sighted Spanish government orders the detention of political leaders that could only accuse of one thing: to labor in behalf of finding a solution to a political conflict. Once again, Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero and Alfredo Perez Rubalcaba have received the priceless support of several media outlets and journalists that throughout Sunday used their news notes to thinly disguised their announcements that such an operation was about to take place.
Throughout these last few months Madrid has been trying to bring to the main stage a series of lies and misconceptions directed at preparing the ground for an operation of such large scope with all the resources at hand. Rubalcaba, as is quite obvious now, has been the mouth piece for this strategy, and media oulets like "El País" have echoed this farce aimed at manipulating the Spanish public's perception - and probably the European public's perception as well since there is a lot of interest and concern about the situation in Euskal Herria - into believing that "ETA has taken complete control over the pro-Independence left" and that "ETA lost all confidence on the political leaders and decided to leave them out of the political initiative that they wanted to propose during the fall", just like the mentioned media outlet published last Sunday. It doesn't matter if the message broadcasted from Madrid is loaded with misinformation, and that in the end it contradicts itself. Another example of this could be easily seen just yesterday by the language on the note reproduced by a large portion of the Spanish media outlets and news agencies, when they went on an on about how the detainees "had maintained meeting during the last months as a response to the political proposal announced by Arnaldo Otegi that the pro-Independence left pretended to use to return to the institutions presumably with an explicit distancing stance regarding violence". The kin reader would quickly notice, without a doubt, that the very same paragraph includes concepts like "political proposal" and "explicit distancing stance regarding violence", which could lead any European observer to shake his head in amazement - which is actually happening right now - when faced with the stark truth that the Spanish state continues to incarcerate politicians for tackling such issues, according to the mentioned media outlets and news agencies.
It is quite obvious that the absence of compelling reasons have never stopped the Spanish state, and that it has always counted with reliable operators in Euskal Herria to try and dilute the will of the majority of the Basque people.
Throughout these last few months Madrid has been trying to bring to the main stage a series of lies and misconceptions directed at preparing the ground for an operation of such large scope with all the resources at hand. Rubalcaba, as is quite obvious now, has been the mouth piece for this strategy, and media oulets like "El País" have echoed this farce aimed at manipulating the Spanish public's perception - and probably the European public's perception as well since there is a lot of interest and concern about the situation in Euskal Herria - into believing that "ETA has taken complete control over the pro-Independence left" and that "ETA lost all confidence on the political leaders and decided to leave them out of the political initiative that they wanted to propose during the fall", just like the mentioned media outlet published last Sunday. It doesn't matter if the message broadcasted from Madrid is loaded with misinformation, and that in the end it contradicts itself. Another example of this could be easily seen just yesterday by the language on the note reproduced by a large portion of the Spanish media outlets and news agencies, when they went on an on about how the detainees "had maintained meeting during the last months as a response to the political proposal announced by Arnaldo Otegi that the pro-Independence left pretended to use to return to the institutions presumably with an explicit distancing stance regarding violence". The kin reader would quickly notice, without a doubt, that the very same paragraph includes concepts like "political proposal" and "explicit distancing stance regarding violence", which could lead any European observer to shake his head in amazement - which is actually happening right now - when faced with the stark truth that the Spanish state continues to incarcerate politicians for tackling such issues, according to the mentioned media outlets and news agencies.
It is quite obvious that the absence of compelling reasons have never stopped the Spanish state, and that it has always counted with reliable operators in Euskal Herria to try and dilute the will of the majority of the Basque people.
.... ... .
Tuesday, October 13, 2009
8 Basque Activists Arrested
Spanish police operating in the Basque Country arrested Arnaldo Otegi, Batasuna's moral leader, the banned political party, and eight other activists, accusing them for the second time of seeking to rebuild the party, judicial and police sources said.Batasuna's spokesman Arnaldo Otegi was held in the city of Donostia along with top union leader Rafa Déz and three other Basque activists suspected.
The interior ministry said later that four other "leaders of the independentist left" had been picked up, two in the Basque town of Hernani and two in Iruñea. Batasuna was banned in 2003 because of its supposed links with ETA, an accusation that the Spanish state is yet to prove.
Police made the first arrests after a meeting at the Basque independence union LAB headquarters. The operation was ordered by Madrid's top inquisidor judge Baltasar Garzon. Those arrested included the secretary general of the LAB union, Rafael Diez Usabiaga, a well-known figure in the Basque independence movement, the judicial source said.
The group of Basque pro-independence activists has been meeting at the union headquarters since the beginning of the year in an effort to put forward a political proposal that includes a new initiative to restart the peace process that was derailed by Zapatero's government back in 2006.
Otegi in the past few months has made several trips to southern Iparralde, where he met with other leaders of his political party that happens to be legal in the French state. Otegi was last jailed in June 2007 after the Supreme Court upheld a 15-month sentence for "glorifying terrorism" after praising veteran ETA leader Jose Miguel Beñaran "Argala" at a memorial service in 2003. "Argala" was murdered by the GAL at the height of the "dirty war" against the Basque pro-independence movement.
.... ... .
Rejection of Spain's Fascist Festivity Increases
The obsession by Francisco Javier Lopez and his junta to distance themselves from the previous tenants at the Ajuria Enea and loudly proclaim the change of pace that has allegedly taken place in Lakua's government is now in plain sight.For example, just yesterday, Rodolfo Ares (born in Orense, Galiza and a rabid Spanish ultra-nationalist), in representation of Lakua's government, attended the Spanish Armed Forces parade in Madrid to celebrate the "Day of Hispanity". A carefully chosen decision by the Interior Minister and top commander of the Ertzaintza, to witness and also legitimate the outdated military display that each year exacerbates the must backwards Spanish cheap patriotism.
Looking to make himself clear, Ares went on to explain that he traveled to the Spanish capital in representation of "the Basque Government and, therefore, the totality of Basque society". More so, his presence was an "act of democratic normality of an autonomic government that emanates from the Statute, an Statute framed within the Constitution". Neither one is true. The current Lakua government is not the result of the will of the citizenry of Araba, Bizkaia and Gipuzkoa, but the result of the Apartheid like Law of Political Parties' political-juridic engineering. We should also point out now that the Spanish Constitution was never accepted by the Basque electorate, quite the opposite actually.
While Ares travels to Madrid to present the due abjection before the must outdated expressions of the Spanish kingdom, in the streets of Euskal Herria thousands of persons demonstrated against Fascism, the current and the former, the one that filled up the sides of the roads with dead bodies and the one that abducts and threatens Basque citizens. Besides, thousands of students showed up at their educational institutions, thus signaling their rebellion against a holiday that they do not regard as such. On top of that, several demonstrations were organized by the worker's union LAB to voice another demand, the sovereign right of the working class to decide its own calendar. That one and no other was the human landscape yesterday in Euskal Herria, a country that refuses to accept and imposed festivity.
.... ... .
Sunday, October 11, 2009
Wednesday, October 07, 2009
Tuesday, October 06, 2009
Winds of Freedom in Catalunya
It started in the tiny town of Arenys de Munt, know its all over 100 towns across Catalunya. Madrid spends millions of euros each year making sure that the main stream media portrays the political conflicts in Catalunya, Nabarra and Galiza as something of no consequence when in reality Spain fails to comply with the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights that demands self determination for all nations that endure colonial occupation.
So you can imagine just how angry Spaniard must be to see that the international community is learning about the call for independence in Catalunya. Here you have one example, an article published at Bloomberg:
We want to remind Emma Ross-Thomas that Catalunya, Nabarra and Galiza are not mere "regions", they are nations.
Oh, and maybe she could venture telling us how many Basques have been murdered since the XII century when Castile started the invasion and colonization of Nabarra (the Basque Country).
So you can imagine just how angry Spaniard must be to see that the international community is learning about the call for independence in Catalunya. Here you have one example, an article published at Bloomberg:
Catalan Mayors Plan Independence Vote in Challenge to Zapatero
Emma Ross-ThomasOct. 5 (Bloomberg) -- More than 100 towns in Catalonia voted to hold referendums proposing independence from Spain, an attempt to press national leaders to heed their views.
The 117 unofficial referendums will take place on Dec. 12, Feb. 28 and April 25, Jordi Fabrega, spokesman of the Decidim.cat initiative said in a telephone interview after a meeting of around 100 mayors and municipal representatives near Barcelona on Oct. 3. The movement includes representatives from all political parties except the People’s Party, the biggest national opposition group, he said.
“As the constitution prohibits it, we decided to do it ourselves in a very democratic way,” Fabrega said. Private entities will organize the voting to avoid legal problems for the town halls, which are not allowed to hold referendums. “There’s no stopping us now.”
The polls, which have no legal weight, are an attempt to exert pressure on the government of Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero to allow Catalans to decide whether they want to remain part of Spain. They will follow a similar poll in the village of Arenys de Munt on Sept. 13, where 96 percent favored independence. Described by the government as illegal and unconstitutional, the referendums may also stir unease in the capitals of other European countries such as the U.K., France and Belgium where separatists are pushing for more autonomy.
“It may cause a frisson of concern if they seem to give others what would be perceived to be false hope,” said Hugo Brady, Senior Research Fellow at the Centre for European Reform, a London-based think-tank.
Autonomous Regions
Spain’s 1978 constitution ended an almost 40-year dictatorship and established a system of autonomous regions with varying degrees of self-government, including Catalonia and the Basque Country, both of which have their own police and use co- official languages. Rather then defuse nationalism, the return to democracy and entry into the European Union fueled tensions. The Basque terror group ETA has killed more than 800 people in its campaign for independence.
Catalonia’s economy is the biggest in Spain, accounting for almost 20 percent of gross domestic product. Its capital, Barcelona, is home to Spain’s largest gas company, Gas Natural SDG SA and third-largest lender by assets, La Caixa.
Joan Costa i Font, a lecturer in European social policy at the London School of Economics, said the referendums were a “laboratory experiment to test the central state reaction,” and a “first step towards a large-scale referendum backed by the Catalan parliament.”
Independence Favored
More than half of Catalans favor some kind of break with the central government, according to a poll in July by the regional government. Nineteen percent backed outright independence with another 32 percent saying it should be a state within a federal Spain, the poll said.
The regional government is a coalition including Socialists and Esquerra Republicana de Catalunya, a republican party which favors independence from Spain and counts Welsh, Corsican, Flemish, and Scottish nationalists among its allies in the European Parliament.
The Scottish administration, led by the Scottish National Party, intends to hold a referendum on independence for 2010, which First Minister Alex Salmond said Sept. 23 may include an option allowing voters to opt for greater autonomy rather than full independence from the U.K.
We want to remind Emma Ross-Thomas that Catalunya, Nabarra and Galiza are not mere "regions", they are nations.
Oh, and maybe she could venture telling us how many Basques have been murdered since the XII century when Castile started the invasion and colonization of Nabarra (the Basque Country).
.... ... .
Saturday, October 03, 2009
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