Beyond the Mass Media Blockade

According to this article appeared at the Seacoast On Line the young film maker Anna Bruning has made a documentary that goes hand in hand with the goal of this blog, to demolish the wall of lies and misconceptions that the international main stream media has built around the Basque people. Here you have it:

UNH senior debuts documentary at film gala Feb. 28

DURHAM — Don’t be surprised if one day you see Anna Bruning at the Cannes Film Festival. The University of New Hampshire senior debuts her first documentary film this weekend, a project that took her to Spain to film and had her rubbing elbows with some of the most accomplished editors and writers in the business at Ken Burns’ Walpole studio.

Bruning, a communication major who also is studying Spanish and cinema studies, unveils her film “Omendu Basques: Beyond the Bombs” Saturday, Feb. 28. The gala, sponsored by UNH’s International Research Opportunities Program (IROP), begins at 6:30 p.m. in the Memorial Union Building, Theatre II. It is free and open to the public, and will include a question-and-answer session following the film.

Bruning’s film is about the Basque people, who live in northern Spain and southwestern France. She tells the story of a people whose rich culture and history have been overshadowed by the Euskadi Ta Askatasuna or ETA, a terroristic organization that has been advocating Basque independence since the 1950s.

“This film is about the people who aren’t involved in terrorism. It’s about their culture, with the primary focus on their language because it is one of the most significant parts of their culture. It is now how they identify themselves. In the past, Basque identity was tied to hereditary traits, but today, identity is much more about the will to be Basque,” Bruning says.

“The Basques were the first to circumnavigate the world. They were the first commercial whalers. It was a Basque crew who helped Columbus sail to America, and they were here fishing for cod before Columbus arrived. Their language – Euskera – is particularly unique, with it and their culture surviving through invasions and Romanization. We have all of these facts, yet if people have even heard about the Basques, it’s usually been about the ETA,” she says.

Bruning first learned about the Basque people during a trip to Spain with her family as a teenager and became interested in documentary filmmaking in high school. After she arrived at UNH, she was encouraged to apply for an internship with noted documentary filmmaker Ken Burns’ Florentine Films. She spent the summer between her sophomore and junior years in the Walpole studio.

“That internship was one of the best summers I ever had. I was so excited to go to work every day. The executive editor went through a number of films with me, explaining – shot by shot – how the editing decisions were made. I also met Ken Burns, who talked to me about his inspiration. The internship really gave me a good background to go into this documentary. I don’t think I would have had enough experience to do it if I hadn’t interned with Ken Burns, and I don’t think IROP would have given me the grant to do the documentary if I hadn’t had the internship,” Bruning says.

After receiving an IROP grant for her documentary film project from the UNH Hamel Center for Undergraduate Research, Bruning spent the summer between her junior and senior years in Spain interviewing Basques and filming. She talked to students, citizens, Basque government officials and organizational leaders who were eager to tell her about the significance of their culture and what it means to be Basque.

“I met a man who, after an hour interviewing with me, told me I should contact his brother. His brother and wife a took day off from work to show me around town, interview with me, and make dinner for me. It demonstrates how proud these people are of their culture and how much they want to share it with others,” Bruning says.

After returning from Spain, Bruning began editing her project and putting it together, again with financial assistance from the UNH Hamel Center for Undergraduate Research. She also received advice and guidance from the experts at Florentine Films. However, the film truly has been an independent effort for her and she hopes it will lead to a career as a filmmaker.

And like any first-time filmmaker, she’s a bit nervous about the film gala.

“My friends say it’s very normal to be very nervous when you get this close to the end of a film project. I have friends and family coming from out of state to the gala, and I’m excited to share this with everyone who has known about it for so long. I am excited about the opportunity to experience the whole filmmaking process and share my love of this culture with other people,” Bruning says.

To be precise, ETA is not overshadowing the Basque people, it is the mass media the one being paid by the Spanish government to reduce the Basque identity to the eventual ETA action. Just one example, when has the main stream media gone crazy about one of the many torture cases against Basque activists over the past years? Never.

This is why Spain and France can get away with their violence against the Basque people, thanks to the operators in the big news agencies who make sure to censor it so the public does not get to learn what is really going on.

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New Ideas

As we all know by now, Spaniards openly reject new ideas, that is why they have been so slow in getting the grasp of concepts like justice, democracy, law, self-determination, freedom and many others that define modern societies.

Back in 2003 the Spanish establishment, including of course the news outlets (main stream media) launched itself against a documentary called "The Basque Ball : The Skin Against the Wall" by Basque film maker Julio Medem. They unleashed a campaign of hateful lies and misconceptions against a director that had been courageous enough to leave aside the fame he obtained thanks to his movie "Sex and Lucia" to tackle the issue of the Basque struggle for peace and self-determination. He invited people on both sides of the issue to freely expose their reason to be for or against the Basque people's will to decide its own future. Hypocrites as always, the members of the pro-Franco Partido Popular (PP) first refused the invitation to participate in the film to then insist that their voiced had been silenced with this documentary.

Well, the Spanish media is back at demonizing a movie director for dearing to address the issue of ETA from a perspective that is different to that of the Spanish extreme-right.

Here you have an article regarding this appeared at Yahoo News:

San Sebastian festival tackles ETA in film which divides critics

by Virginie Grognou
Tue Sep 23, 6:34 PM ET

The armed campaign by the Basque separatist group ETA came to the San Sebastian film festival Tuesday with the screening of "Shot in the Head", a film which had critics sharply divided.

The third feature of Spanish director Jaime Rosales had been anxiously awaited at the festival in the Basque city following the news of three ETA car-bombings in Spain at the weekend, which left one soldier dead and 11 people wounded.

"Tiro en la cabeza", ("Shot in the Head"), filmed in just two weeks, tells the true life story of two Spanish policeman who were killed by ETA gunmen in southwest France last December.

"I wanted to show that there is nothing more absurd than people killing each other for ideological reasons. It is a film about the absurdity of violence," Rosales told a news conference.

But the filmmaker took a huge risk in deciding to shoot to the film without any dialogue at all.

The viewer can see the characters speaking, but only hears the background noises, mostly cars, in a novel technique that left many frustrated, even bored.

Rosales shows the "normal" life of a member of ETA, Ion, played by a Basque actor, Ion Arretxe, with his family, but which ends when he kills one of the policeman with a shot to the head.

The film left journalists at the festival divided, with some criticizing his "ambiguous" vision of the Basque problem and over-sympathetic portrayal of the ETA killer, and others hailing his courage in taking an artistic risk.

The director defended the film by saying he "simply wanted to bring new ideas."

Somehow it reminds me of "The Battle of Algiers". Hopefully it will be screened all over the world.

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Gernika's Bombing Cuban Witness

This interview you are about to read was published at Cuban News Headlines. Here it is:

Testimony of the Sole Cuban Survivor of Guernica

A significant historical-cultural plaza in the Basque country, the city —under the control of Republican forces at the time of the attack— was a strategic post containing the advance guard of the Franco forces during the Spanish Civil War.

Seventy-year-old Jorge Eduardo from Cienfuegos, Cuba witnessed the barbaric bombing of Guernica, Spain, which he is detailing in a book.

On April 26, 1937, planes from the German Condor Legion, with the approval of dictator Francisco Franco, leveled the defenseless Basque town of Guernica after several hours of bombing with more than 3,000 incendiary missiles and 550-pound bombs.

Renowned South African journalist George Steer denounced the act of genocide two days later on the front pages of the New York Times and the London Times.

As Ricardo Bada said in his exceptional chronicle dedicated to Steer, «Thanks to his truthful report, the false claims of the Nazi regime and Franco propaganda failed. Italian and German pilots were shown to be responsible for the hecatomb by low-flying machine gunning against the population escaping the destruction in the sacred Basque city.» Jorge Eduardo Elguezábal Martínez was born in town of Soledad, in the central Cuban province of Cienfuegos, on October 22, 1925.

He witnessed the attack on Guernica 70 years ago, which is powerfully reflected in the famous painting by Pablo Picasso, symbolizing the total destruction of the town and making an appeal for peace. Jorge Eduardo is writing a book on the act of genocide committed in Guernica.

—Why were you there that day?

My grandparents, parents, brothers and I left for Spain in 1932 due to an illness of my grandfather, who was born in La Coruña, Galicia. He was suffering from the effects of hard work as a blacksmith, which was an important position at the time.

«Work with the forge and the hammer is very violent. The doctors recommended a cold climate, so we stayed in the United States for four years before leaving for Europe. There, we stayed in a Galician town for three years before arriving in Guernica in 1935. I was the youngest of the three brothers and was ten years old.»

—What was your life like in Guernica?

«Not really good. We suffered from hunger and cold —real hunger and cold— for two years. During that time I ate meat only once. We lived on chickpeas and pieces of bread. «My father walked the countryside looking for greens and my mother put them in the soup pot to make us believe that we were really eating something. Since I was the youngest, I was the only one put to bed with something in my stomach...some times. «My brother, Casimiro and my sister, Luisa, as well as my mother Maria Luisa and all the rest went to bed every day with empty stomachs. We couldn’t receive any help from our relatives in Cuba because northern Spain was blockaded.»

— What were you doing at the moment of the bombing?

Almost every day we went into our shelter when the alarms sounded. It was more or less three blocks from home. «That day, the 26th, was like any other day. We went into the shelter in the afternoon. The bombing occurred during a fair in the town, although little was done because of the very difficult economic situation. Sometimes a farmer would bring a little animal and exchange it or if he was lucky, sell it. «We arrived at the shelter as the bombs were falling. Farmers at the fair who were caught in front of the plaza went in with us. The various shelters had capacities for about 600 persons, although ours held almost a thousand. «Everything started shortly after 4:00 in the afternoon. We stayed there holed up for three days, although at 7:00 of the 26th we went out to find out what had happened.»

—What did you see? What was your impression?

«What I saw that day was clearly stamped in my memory. The scene was unbelievably cruel. I don’t remember seeing any life, just like that, nothing. People were screaming, crying, embracing each other and asking about the whereabouts of their children, brothers or parents. «It’s easy to say, but the moment has to be witnessed, with dead of all ages alongside of you, headless animals, people with parts ripped off, wounded people all around; everything on fire, with everything burnt out. My mother hugged me ... «I don’t think that there are words to really explain the massacre that I have in front of my eyes right now, since it’s something I’ll never forget, not for a single moment. «Historians say that three quarters of Guernica was destroyed, but I walked the city from end to end after the catastrophe and I can clearly say that 99 percent was destroyed. «Three buildings were left standing: the Casa de Juntas, the Santa María de Guernica church and the Pistols and Silverwork Factory. The latter was the property of a rich Franco supporter, and the church supported Franco... this was clear as water!»

—Did the Nazi bombs wound any of your family, or friends or contacts?

It was a miracle that my brother didn’t die. That day he wasn’t at his post, the press was destroyed forever and none of the workers survived; they were friends of ours, and not even their bodies were found. «There were more than 2,000 dead although government sources claim 1,600 and others even mention less. With all this jumbling of figures no one will ever know the truth.»

—Does this recall anything?

With what is happening in Iraq I recalled that massacre. I watch Guernica repeated every night on TV. I put myself in the place of those poor people, remembering that my family suffered nervous disorders for close to 20 years after returning to Cuba every time they heard a siren or a bell.

—You have made an exhaustive historical study of the event. In a television documentary, you said that you considered Guernica as an experiment and that also it was a symbol of German war concepts. Why do you believe this?

«The bombing» of Guernica was determined by the German high command who ordered the Condor Legion in Spain to choose a town to see how women, men and children reacted to the bombing. «The intention was to examine people’s responses. In effect, it was a damned Nazi experiment. «The town had no system of defense whatsoever. A sadly and infamous fascist general, depraved to the point of delirium, joked in this manner: «We will bomb the young women of Guernica with chocolates. «The Condor Legion had its base in the northern Spanish region of Vitoria. That was where they had the hangars for their latest model planes that they needed to test before World War II. «US journalist Herbert Mathews considered it a prototype of total bombing. «According to Professor Ludger Mees, historian and deputy director of the University of the Pais Vasco “Guernica was a field test for Nazi military strategies, for its technology, its planes and bombs. In other words, Hitler used this attack to prepare the war machine that he would eventually unleash on the world.»

— It takes some time to write a book. How did you structure it, what can you tell us about it?

This year, on the 70th anniversary of the massacre, the Guernica Peace Declaration was signed in which the text affirms that the event is a mirror reflecting the injustice of today’s bombings and allows us to have an insight into wars taking place around the world. «I think the next generation will have more detailed knowledge, with first hand information, of such a frightening experience as that one. Though unfortunately is has serious limitations in the present context. The purpose of my book is to keep alive the memory of the genocide that occurred in imperial wars. «It begins in the central Cienfuegos town of Soledad where I lived my early years. It is centered from the perspective of that Cuban family —mine— which, for those reasons explained, needed to leave for Spain during the 30s.

«I also deal with the time prior to our arrival and include many photographs and original postcards of the main sites of the Basque town, as well as many drawings of what I still remember. «I also added the photograph of an oak that is still standing after the air attack that killed so many people, including my schoolmates. The tree is a now symbol. «But, also, in a lighter touch, I refer to the way of life of the inhabitants of the region, their customs (how the bread they made themselves that could stay fresh for 15 to 20 days), their folklore, there rural legends...».

— What is the time period covered in the text?

It concludes when we return to Cuba during the early 40s. I didn’t consider it necessary to add more.

(www.juventudrebelde.co.cu)

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42 Imprisoned

This information comes to us thanks to the Irish Solidarity Committees With The Basque Country:

EH NEWS: SPANISH INQUISITION

Spanish Court orders arrests of 46 defendants on 18/98

11/30/2007

The sentence on this case is not going to be announced until December, but judges have already considered their verdict and that is why they ordered the arrests of the defendants.

34 people have been arrested so far accused of being related to 18/98 case, judicial officials reported. Spanish National Court ordered on Friday the arrests of 46 defendants on this this macro-trial.

This trial was the largest ever made in terms of the number of defendants. The judges heard testimonies of more than 300 people. Those on trial included alleged members of Basque social political gropus, media and other organizations. Spanish National Court banned their activities citing they were supporters of Basque armed group ETA.

Spanish Court ordered all the arrests, investigation officials reported. According to these sources, the sentence on this case is not going to be read until December. But, the court has ordered police to put them under detention before the convictions are announced, a court official said.

List of arrested people

Txema Matanzas, Jesus Mari Zalakain, Elena Beloki, Alberto Frias, Javier Balanzategi, Javier Salustregi, Joxe Mari Olarra, Mikel Korta, Iñaki O'Shea, Juan Mari Mendizabal, Mario Zubiaga, Iker Casanova, Manuel Intxauspe, Jose Garcia Mijangos, Natale Landa and Olatz Egiguren.

The International commission "Euskal Herria Watch" on case 18/98

The "Euskal Herria Watch" international commission, made up of lawyers from various countries, had the opportunity to participate in the sessions celebrated between the 21 st of November 2005 and the 14 th of March of 2007 in the 18/98 proceeding. The parties on trial are private businesses, the newspaper Egin and the radio station Egin Irratia, the Basque political organisation Ekin, the foundation for the promotion of the social movements Joxemi Zumalabe and the European association Xaki for international activity.

This report contains a summary of our main concerns, based on the monitoring work carried out, as well as a series of conclusions regarding this particular trial.

The accusation

The public prosecution and the private prosecution carried by the Association of Victims of Terrorism charged 51 people who have participated in the mentioned businesses and associations with a crime of "belonging to a terrorist organisation". On this bases, the prosecution asked for 10 to 50 years of prison for the defendants, as well as other accessory penalties. Afterwards, the prosecutor reduced the petition for 4 to 19 years depending on the consideration of "collaboration" with or "membership" of an armed group. Among the defendants the persons prosecuted for their relationship with the Egin newspaper's board of directors faced the higher petitions. In total, where before the prosecution asked for 927 years of imprisonment, now they ask for 484.

The charges brought by the Investigating judge and taken on by the public prosecution and the private prosecution are not rooted in any concrete facts or particular evidence. The charges are based on the idea that these people participated in the aforementioned organisations to infer afterwards that these organisations belong to ETA. Even if the first part of that logic is granted because of the public and notorious activity of these social and political activists, the second part lacks any reason or evidence to be assessed, but is no more than a speculative interpretation built on suspicions. These suspicions are limited to sporadic contact among defendants and members of the ETA armed organisation, to the interest expressed by ETA about these organisations, reflected in its internal documentation, and finally, to the coincidence in the political goals: sovereignty for the Basque Country. The suspicions on which the charges are based are not criminal activity. The situation could be explained as the late German lawyer and observer, Martin Poell manifested to the media "we have known about cases without evidence, but this is the first case that does not even have crimes".

Without individualized criminal conduct, the construction of the connexion among these organisations on trial with ETA is mere speculation.

The public hearing: the right to a defence

The defence has come across an unlimited number of difficulties to exercise their professional task. A list of issues that had to be solved before the hearings began could have stopped it: the trial began in the absence of three defendants, without the orders for them to be brought before the court having been issued. A previous appeal challenging a number of expert witnesses had not been resolved; it was rejected by the tribunal on the spot. The prosecution has requested a number of companies to be declared illegal and have their assets seized, and they have not even been summoned to appear in court. They have not been notified of the charges, which amounts to civil death, because they are not party to the proceedings and cannot defend themselves, therefore, if they were convicted this would mean the proceedings will be voided. Last, but not least in terms of the guaranteeing of the right to a defence, a series of documentary tests requested by the defence before the beginning of the trial have not been carried out, despite the fact that they should have been done before the trial began and that the tribunal had agreed to their being carried out. It is due to the hurry showed by the Court to carry on with the hearing that these questions, that can bring about an effect of nullity, were simply ignored.

A decision to begin and continue the trial was made by the tribunal, over and above the fact that the case –a 207,000 page-long monster- is in a state of chaotic disorder. There is no index of pieces of evidence; the whereabouts of these pieces of evidence is often unknown, which makes access to the evidence difficult for both prosecution and defence; finding a document means an effort that often turns out to be futile, thereby causing repeated adjournments to continue the search.

On the 15th session of the trial, the 21st of December 2005, the evidence in Prior Proceedings 75/89, was brought to the Court. It is a series of police reports, transcriptions of tapped phone conversations and other documents which have been kept under official secret since 1989. The prosecution had access to that documentation but not the defence; these documents remained in secrecy for them. Due to the impossibility to have access to that evidence even being brought to the Court, t he defence lawyers requested the protection of their respective Bar Associations and the Basque Council of Lawyers. Those plus the President of the Spanish Council of Lawyers held a meeting with the President of the Audiencia Nacional to grant the fundamental right to a defence.

One of the most shocking violations of the right to a defence in the view of the observers that have participated in this first part of the hearings was the ban on the defendants to make their statement freely in front of the Court and, more specifically their right to explain why they were refusing to answer the questions by the prosecution. The defendants had decided this, as a clear political statement. Nevertheless, the president of the Court cut the intervention of the defendants forbidding any further explanation immediately after declaring their refusal to answer. Of course, if it is not appropriately explained, by attitude on the part of the defendants can be understood as a fearful or doubtful position under cross examination by the prosecutor. One of the lawyers mentioned the jurisprudence of the European Court in Strasbourg – dated 2 May 2000, in the Condron vs. the UK case-, annulling a trial because the reasons why the defendant was remaining silent were not stated in the minutes. The president of the Court answered to the lawyer that "I do not care what Strasbourg says".

For this and other reasons we can see that the attitude of the Court has been manifestly aggressive and authoritarian towards the defendants. The inquisitorial character of the hearing and the and the intense and worrying emotive implication of the president of the Court in it, instead of being impartial and "super partes" has been made clear. A Court should uphold basic rights at the time of doing justice, as the effective judicial tutelage for all the people in the exercise of their legitimate rights and interest, without legal protection and the right to a trial with full guaranties, to use all the pertinent means for the defence and the right to be presumed innocent.

It is relevant to underline that the Court never has ruled in favour of the defence in any of the many incidents that have occurred due to irregularities in the development of the proceedings. All of them must be resolved in the final decision by the Court.

Quality of evidence

Throughout the hearing not a single allegation containing concrete, individualised facts was put forward. The evidence consisted of the reading of documents allegedly seized from ETA, statements taken from some defendants under incommunicado detention, telephone tapping and statements by the agents of the Central Unit of Intelligence of the National Police and the Investigation services of the Civil Guard, brought in as court experts and the main revealing factor of the prosecution.

These agents make their anonymous testimony as court experts, understanding that they provide the court with alleged expertise and objective knowledge, in their the field of activity. However, it is clear that, even if they present themselves as expert in the fight against ETA, their statements are an interested and biased account of the facts, as they have taken part in the investigation. They gave their statements collectively, all together, behind a screen that separates them for the public, not from the defendants. They have permission from the tribunal to discuss their answers and correct each other. In practice, the opinion of these agents introduced by the Court as "experts" has the role of rectifying the gaps in the evidence.

Nevertheless, their statement were full of incongruence and contradictions, such as the one referring to the origin of some of the documents, the identities of the persons that appear in those documents under nicknames, or the alleged connection between the newspaper Egin or the Foundation Joxemi Zumalabe with ETA.

One of the matters that have had a shocking effect is the identification of one of the experts as one of the officer conducting torture at the interrogation of Nekane Txapartegi and Mikel Egibar. The latter asked the Court to uphold his right to question the experts. The reaction by the president, Angela Murillo was to shout "sit down! be quiet!" losing her nerves and asking the police that guard the Court to form a human wall between the Civil Guard agents acting as experts and the defendants, who shouted "torturers!!". Murillo, overwhelmed, decided to adjourn the session.

Matters of humanitarian nature

As mentioned, the trial lasted 16 months in a Court especially built in a neighbourhood at the outskirts of Madrid . The defendants were obliged to be present every day that court is in session. The only accommodation was to replace the Thursday and Friday sessions with night sessions on Mondays and Tuesdays. It is surprising to hear that being present in the courtroom is not a right of the defendants, in their best interest, but an obligation imposed on them. It seems evident that this is not a measure aimed at guaranteeing the defendants have full knowledge of the proceedings and a better chance to exercise their right to a defence but an extra obligation imposed on them after the accused had repeatedly stood against it. It has caused many traffic accidents in the long journeys from the Basque Country to Madrid, has generated adjournments and delays due to the difficulties to appear in the Court for all the defendants. It has also made the defendants' daily life more difficult, their family and work activities, and affected their economies, creating a high physical and psychological cost.

A particular mention should be made to the case of Iñigo Elkoro who, due to a serious disease, had to be separated from the trial and a new trial will have to take place, so as not to interfere with the main proceedings. In the case of Jokin Gorostidi, the day before he had to make his statement in court he suffered a he suffered a heart attack with the result of his death on 25 th April 2006. The attitude of the Court towards the defendants can be considered cruel and degrading treatment.

The Issue of Torture

On 6th May 2006 defendant Xabier Alegría declared in court: He has the highest petition from the prosecutor, with 100 years in prison. He explained he had suffered torture during incommunicado detention. The lawyers submitted a copy of other procedures including this fact, the prosecution did not deny the submission and the Court admitted it.

The 18th of April, was the turn of Mikel Egibar who provided the Court with an account of torture during his detention by the Civil Guard on 10th March 1999, including beatings, suffocation with a plastic bag, threats against him and his family… during five days, before was brought to the National Court. The next day Nekane Txapartegi gave her statement, explaining that her incommunicado detention lasted 10 days and included death threats, the plastic bag and sexual harassment, even being raped by four Civil Guards.

The statements taken under torture are used by the court to base the accusations in this trial 18/98 and to introduce incriminatory evidence against the people that suffered it and the rest of the defendants.

Conclusions: ideological accusation and expansive interpretation of the penal definitions

The accusation carried by the public Prosecutor and the Association of Victims of Terrorism asked, in their separated reports, for a conviction while the defence asked for acquittal of all defendants.

The reports of conclusions of the accusations are not based on the reasons and evidence that have appeared during the hearing. On the contrary, they come from the first interpretation developed during the stage of investigation by the head of Court of Investigation nº 5 of the National Court, Baltasar Garzón. The public prosecutor, as he lacks evidence to support his theory, recited a brief and specific review of the history of ETA, to wind up his statement on the organisations and businesses that are on trial, and to recount the charges brought against them: KAS would be an "instrument" used by ETA for "direction of the movement", which, at the same time, would control a business scheme dedicated to maintaining ETA members abroad" and members of KAS itself. Ekin, according to this theory, would have been created to "replace" KAS; Xaki would be the latest version of "ETA's external relations"; and the Joxemi Zumalabe Foundation would have taken the baton from ASK to continue to "invigorate the popular movement". Finally, Egin and its publishing company Orain S.A. would make up ETA's "intermediary front" or "fourth front".

At this point, the representative of the Attorney General had no other choice than to admit that the written charges contained serious errors, and that several of the charges against the defendants had no legal foundation. Nevertheless, he concluded that participating in any of these organisations is at the same time to be an active member of ETA due to the "divisional theory". "All of the structures participating in that global structure" which for him the nationalist left is, "are contaminated with the goals and objectives" of ETA. So, lacking rational evidence, the accusations will use an ideological interpretation, a philosophical deduction to ask the Court to deliver a conviction.

But moreover, the designation of the facts as crimes of "collaboration" or "belonging to an armed group" are based on a new definition of terrorism tailor-made to include the activities in this trial. In fact, the prosecutor asked the Court, contrarily to the classic jurisprudence that advocates for a restricted interpretation of the concept of terrorism, to make it wider to include these social and political activities. To do so, he counts with the precedent of the decision of the Supreme Court in the 18/01 case referred to the youth organisations Haika-Segi.

On 19/02/2005 the Audiencia Nacional issued a decision whereby it stated the youth organisations Jarrai, Haika and Segi are not terrorist organisations because they do not use weapons or explosives, although the Court did declare them illegal and sentenced 24 young Basques to between two and half years and three and a half years in prison, more or less the time they had served in pre trial detention. This decision was appealed by the defence and the Prosecution, for different reasons, before the Supreme Court. The defence asking for the acquittal and the prosecution, specifically, defended its aim was to obtain new jurisprudence on the definition of "belonging to an armed group" which could be applied in other proceedings.

On January 19, 2007, the Supreme Court published its decision. Indeed, three of the judges believe these organisations are "illegal associations which amount to a terrorist gang, organisation or group" and gave 23 young Basques 6 years in prison whilst they acquitted one. The decision introduces a new expansive interpretation of what is an "armed organisation", as was asked in the appeal by the Association of Victims of Terrorism "according to the new times". A further two members of the Tribunal voted against this decision, giving a dissident vote considering that it "creates a new configuration of armed group" taking into account two elements: one the entity of the facts related to the practice of the "urban guerrilla", that can not be compared to the "terrorist acts that are committed by terrorist groups that have deserved the application of the crime of armed organisation" and as stated by the magistrate Martínez Arrieta and for the lack of real integration in the armed structure, opinion of magistrate Giménez García: «if there is a invitation to become a member of ETA it means that you do not belong to it, so the candidate comes from a different collective to ETA ». Thus, both magistrates of the Supreme Court supported the initial interpretation of the National Court.

The chain of armed activity established, in penal terms, from the urban guerrilla to finish with the public and peaceful political action that now is under judgement must be taken into account. This interpretation will be the determinant element in the deliberations of the Third section of the Penal Room of the National Court to reach a decision.

Conclusions

On the aforementioned findings, the International Commission "Euskal Herria Watch" wish to make public the next conclusions.

1. The investigation of the 18/98 case has been carried out in a chaotic manner and in flagrant violation of the right to a defence, using the secrecy of actions in an absolutely unacceptable way.

2. The violations of equality of opportunities between the prosecution and the defence are quite alarming. The tribunal did not accept a single one of the challenges brought by the defence.

3. The lack of precision as to the allegedly criminal activities and the lack of individual charges contravenes, in an essential way, the bases of the rule of law whereby a defendant must face charges -involving certain criminal conduct- from which he or she can defend himself or herself.

4. The treatment dispensed to the defendants during the hearing, including the obligation to travel and be present in all the sessions has generated a physical and psychological cost that could be considered a form of cruel and inhuman treatment. The effect of this on the health of the defendants is ascertained.

5. The use of statements which were allegedly made under torture is an intrinsic violation of human rights, because of the use of torture itself, and even the allegation should void the evidence.

6. The quality of the evidence was completely inappropriate, with many irregularities, rational doubt as to the origin of documentary evidence and blatant inefficiency of the witnesses called by the prosecution. The expert evidence given by members of the State Security Forces deserves special comment, as the tribunal has elevated police suspicion, prejudice and speculation to the level of scientific, objective and infallible evidence.

7. The use of ambiguous legal definitions and their broad and inclusive application contradict the principle of legality.

8. The state is attempting to criminalise legal, public and transparent activities through a political trial. This is, in itself, a serious attack on the right to freedom of speech, opinion and association. The mention in documents and statements of other associations during the hearing is an attack on their rights and their legal security.

9. We also believe that the Tribunal, the Audiencia Nacional is a special Tribunal for crimes of terrorism and given its high level of politicisation , and the nervous and authoritarian attitude of the chair of the Court, it would seem that the verdict, instead of being an act to find criminal facts and seek justice has been an attempt to provide a appearance of justice to a political decision.

10. Still waiting for the decision, the development of the hearings, the position taken by the prosecutions, the tension generated due to the attitude of the president of the Court and the precedent that was given by the Supreme Court in reference to the 18/01 Haika-Segi case bring us to deduct that the final decision will have an extremely poor juridical quality.

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A Basque American Way of Life

This note describing the journey of a documentary filming crew from Euskal Herria in the USA was published by The Sparks Tribune:

Basque film crew stops in Sparks to document and discover“American way of life”

By Jessica Mosebach
jmosebach@sparkstribune.net

John Ascuaga's Nugget played host this weekend to five young Basque professionals who indulged in the "American way of life," including larger drink and meal portions and friendly people.

The crew came from the Spanish Basque region of Europe to work on a television documentary series called “Basques in America,” exploring the Basque culture in the western U.S. The team — all native Basques — arrived in Los Angeles on Nov. 2 and includes a field producer, two reporters, a cameraman and a camera assistant. They traveled north through California earlier in November, stopping in Bakersfield, San Francisco and Sacramento before arriving in Nevada.

The experience has been an eye-opener for them, especially in the way of American life, they said.

The culture is very different here, said reporter Ander San Sebastian through translator Adela Ucar.

“Things are bigger,” San Sebastian said. "Just like a normal coffee is double the size we get .... It's been very exciting to get to know the American culture. It’s very spectaculous.”

This past weekend, they made a stop in Sparks to film the Ascuaga family at John Ascuaga’s Nugget. They also spent time with students at the Center of Basque Studies at the University of Nevada, Reno.

On Saturday, they interviewed Michonne Ascuaga, daughter of John Ascuaga and chief executive officer of the hotel-casino. Michonne spoke of her family's Basque background in the Nugget's Restaurante Orozko, which serves Basque cuisine.

To complete the documentary, the crew members were sent through the European production company, Flying Apple TV & Film Producers, S.L.

Zigor Etxebarria Enbeita, 29, and Aldo Ferraris, 37, and are long-time employees of the company. Emma Marín, 24, San Sebastian, 24, and Ucar, 27, were hired as freelancers.

"Basques in America" will feature five stories: three biographical stories, one story on Basque women in Boise and one on the Basque population in Bakersfield.

"It's been very interesting knowing second-generation Basques, who, even though they were born here, they still speak Basque and they still feel a big attachment to Basque and its culture,” Enbeita said.

"It's still very vibrant, the community," Ucar said of the population.

The European Basque culture is found in two different regions. The French Basques are located southwest of France and the Spanish Basques border north-central Spain and inhabit the Pyrenee mountains.

According to Ucar, the French Basques migrated to Bakersfield while the Spanish Basques predominantly came to Reno and Boise.

The culture is unique in that its language is not rooted in any Germanic or Slavic family. However, Ucar said it is possible there is a Celtic language connection.

Ucar called the Basques “proficient travelers,” speaking to their historical contributions of “conquering new horizons.”

"You can find a Basque descendant all over the world," San Sebastian added, including South America and China.

During its first six days, the crew followed and profiled Joe Ansolabehere, the creator of television shows "Recess" and "Rugrats," as well as his colleague Paul Germain.

As it progressed to Stockton, the members devoted one day to California Lt. Gov. John Garamendi and his family on his ranch.

San Sebastian, speaking through Ucar, said, "I think none of us had been through California before, so the trip in itself has been very interesting because (of) knowing all those characters with (such) different lives ... and backgrounds."

Marin did some research in preparation for the trip and found that the largest Basque population is in the U.S. is in the west, but said she didn't find any concrete numbers. Regardless, Marin said the response toward the crew's work was very positive by those they met with during their trip.

"We've all been very, very welcomed by the Basque community," Marin said. "Our work was very much appreciated. They kept saying, 'Thank you so much for doing this story on us, for being interested in our culture,' when it's us who are thankful for them letting us into their lives. They were very emotional about telling their stories and passionate."

Each reflected on what they learned the most of this trip. Ferraris joked and said for him, it's "an American way of life!" as the others laughed.

The documentary series is expected to be translated in Basque and aired in Europe in March. Each of the five segments will be an hour long.

The group returns home next week after its last stop in Boise to film for the final segment, "Women in Boise."

This is what Wikipedia tells us about Sparks:

Sparks is a city in Washoe County, Nevada, United States. The population was 66,346 at the 2000 census. Estimates in 2006 place the population at around 90,000 due to rapid growth in areas such as Spanish Springs, Wingfield Springs, and D'Andrea. Although Sparks was originally distinct from Reno, they have both grown toward each other to such a degree that today the border between them is purely political. They are often referred to as a twin city (i.e. "Reno-Sparks").

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Keith Johnson : Basque-Phobe of the Week

What do you get when you send a dim witted US citizen to Spain to be your correspondent?

Well, articles like this one from Keith Johnson, published by the Wall Street Journal on what could be consider a case of slander against the Basque people.

Here you have it:

Basque Inquisition: How Do You Say Shepherd in Euskera?

Through Fiat, Separatists Bring Old Tongue to Life; 'Zientzia' and Other Updates

By KEITH JOHNSON

November 6, 2007; Page A1

BILBAO, Spain -- Rosa Esquivias is caught on the front line of the Basques' fight for independence from Spain. Actually, she's in the front row -- of her Basque language class.

Ms. Esquivias, a 50-year-old high-school math teacher and Spanish-speaking native of Bilbao, must learn Basque or risk losing her job. Like her nine classmates, including a man who teaches Spanish to immigrants, she has been given at least a year off with pay to spend 25 hours a week drilling verbs and learning vocabulary in Euskera -- a language with no relation to any other European tongue and spoken by fewer than one million people. About 450 million people world-wide speak Spanish.

Oh, so, according to Keith's logic, the amount of people that speaks a language decides what language gets to go on and which one should disappear. Well, there goes what we like to call cultural diversity.

"For the job I do, I think learning the language is clearly over the top," Ms. Esquivias says.

Basque separatists have been waging a struggle for independence from Spain for 39 years. But lately, many have taken to wielding grammar instead of guns. Separatists still dream of creating their own homeland, but in the meantime they are experimenting with pushing a strict regime of Euskera into every corner of public life. Of the present-day Basque Country's approximately 2.1 million inhabitants, roughly 30% speak Basque; more than 95% speak Spanish.

How strange, the article addresses a public policy put forward by the government of the Basque Autonomous Community, a democratic institution by Western standards. This government is conformed in its majority by Basque parties that support self determination for the Basque people, ranging from a new political pact put forward by the PNV and its two political allies (EB and EA) all the way to out right independence as demanded by ANV. If this policy was able to go through the filter that constitutes the two Spanish parties (PP and PSOE) then it means that it embodies the will of the people.

So, when Keith Johnson says that "...Basque separatists have been waging a struggle for independence from Spain for 39 years. But lately, many have taken to wielding grammar instead of guns..." what he is actually saying is that the vast majority of Basques are gun wielding separatists. This sounds a whole lot like the official posture by the Spanish political elite that claims that all Basques are terrorists or terrorist supporters at the least.

The difference is that Keith Johnson is an US correspondent and he should not be taken sides, he is in Spain to inform, not to have the American public lean towards one side. It is called being professional and most important when it comes to a reporter, unbiased.

It does not stop there, continue reading please:

The regional government of the Basque Country has begun to tighten the screws on its language policy to the point where now, all public employees, from mail-sorters to firemen, must learn Euskera to get -- or keep -- their jobs. Cops are pulled off the street to brush up their grammar. And companies doing business with the Basque government must conduct business in Euskera. Starting next year, students entering public school will be taught only in Basque.

This is a plain out lie and I dare Keith Johnson to prove this assertion. There is three different educational systems in the Basque Autonomous Community and parts of Navarre. You can enroll your kids in either a Basque speaking school with Spanish as a second language, a school with 50/50 policy about the two languages and also a Spanish speaking school with Euskera as second language.

Although there is a shortage of doctors in the Basque Country, the Basque health service requires medical personnel to speak Euskera. Health-service regulations detail how Euskera should be used in every medical situation, from patient consultations down to how to leave a phone message or make an announcement over a public-address system (Basque first, then Spanish). There are rules specifying the typeface and placement of Basque signs in hospitals (Basque labels on top or to the left, and always in bold).

Another lie, there is no doctor shortage in the Basque Country, once again, proof Keith, proof.

The official goal of the Basque policy is to transform Euskera from a "co-official" status with Spanish to "co-equal" status. That, say Euskera proponents, is necessary to make up for years of linguistic repression. The language was banned during the 36-year dictatorship of Francisco Franco, and only began to re-emerge in the 1980s.

Something wrong with that?

"To have a truly bilingual society, you need positive discrimination," says Mertxe Múgica, the head of the Basque language academies where Ms. Esquivias studies. Many Basque speakers still feel discriminated against because of the pervasiveness of Spanish.

But as Basque nationalists try to push their language into the mainstream, they are bumping up against an uncomfortable reality.

"Euskera just isn't used in real life," says Leopoldo Barrera, the head of the center-right Popular Party in the Basque regional Parliament. Though it has existed for thousands of years -- there are written records in Basque that predate Spanish -- it is an ancient language little suited to contemporary life. Euskera has no known relatives, though theories abound linking it to everything from Berber languages to Eskimo tongues.

Well, Keith is really stretching it here, I invite Mr. Barrera to walk with me through the streets of Bilbo, Donosti, Iruñea and in less than five minutes I will show him people speaking Euskera when addressing issues like the most recent soccer match, the weather or why does the US condones the killing of Iraqi civilians by "security" companies like Blackwater.

By the way Keith, you should be more careful, you don't want the WSJ to get a hate crime law suit thrown at them, they are called Inuit, not Eskimo.

Here you have a pearl:

Airport, science, Renaissance, democracy, government, and independence, for example, are all newly minted words with no roots in traditional Euskera: aireportu, zientzia, errenazimentu, demokrazia, gobernu, independentzia.

Correct Keith, I am going to let you in a little secret, Euskera has been around for at least 5,000 years and guess what, back then there was no need for airports because... there was no airplanes!

Besides, those words you mentioned derived from either Greek or Latin, please show me the English versions with no roots in traditional English for those same words.

Meanwhile, there are 10 different words for shepherd, depending on the kind of animal. Astazain, for instance, is a donkey herder; urdain herds pigs. A cowpoke is behizain in Euskera. While Indo-European languages have similar roots for basic words like numbers -- three, drei, tres, trois -- counting in Euskera bears no relation: bat, bi, hiru, lau, and up to hamar, or 10. Religious Basques pray to Jainko.

Yes Keith, just like the Inuit have a hundred words for snow, that does not render their language useless.

The regional government has spent years of effort and billions of euros to make sure that every official document, from job applications for sanitation workers to European Union agricultural grants, is available in Euskera. But this year, in San Sebastian, a hotbed of Basque nationalism and the region's second-largest city, not a single person chose to take the driver's license exam in Euskera, says Mr. Barrera.

The Basque-language TV channel is loaded with Euskera favorites, such as the irrepressible redhead "Pippi Galtzaluze." But the channel has a 4.4% audience share in the Basque Country, according to data from Taylor Nelson Sofres -- less than the animal-documentary channel of public broadcasting.

Even some of the biggest proponents of Basque independence stumble over Euskera's convoluted grammar. Juan José Ibarretxe, the Basque regional president, speaks a less-than-fluent Euskera at news conferences. Like most people in the region, he grew up speaking Spanish and had to learn Euskera as an adult.

Another lie, I have been present at a number of Ibarretxe's public presentations and only a Euskara speaker could tell that he uses Euskara Batua, the unified version of the language.

Other adults who are now running afoul of the new language policy are having similar trouble picking up the tongue. "I guess we're the last of the old guard, but we don't have any choice," says Ignacio Garcia, a math teacher who is a classmate of Ms. Esquivias, and is sweating over a stack of notes before his first big Euskera exam.

The language policy has led to a massive adult re-education push, as tens of thousands in the Basque Country head back to school. Their predicament has become a popular sendup on a Basque comedy show. In one sketch, non-Basque-speaking adults who have been sent to a euskaltegi, or Euskera language school, have to ask schoolchildren to help them with their homework.

In the same token, when speaking Spanish to me there was a young man who had to keep asking his friends how to say this or that word in Spanish.

Joseba Arregui, a former Basque culture secretary, native Basque speaker, and onetime architect of the language policy, feels that Euskera is being pushed too far. "It's just no good for everyday conversation," he says. "When a language is imposed, it is used less, and that creates a diabolical circle of imposition and backlash."

Ahem, Keith, Spanish was imposed in the Basque Country before and I see Basque people going around their business as usual, so, why should it be so bad the other way around?

Shall I remind you how many millions of people were murdered in the process of imposing Spanish around the world?

In the classroom, Euskera use has also allowed separatists to control the curriculum. Basque-language textbooks used in schools never tell students that the Basque Country is part of Spain, for example. No elementary-school texts even mention the word Spain.

Students are taught that they live in "Euskal Herria," stretching across parts of Spain and southern France, that was colonized by "the Spanish State."

Is that bad to say the truth? Because if you read any book history one can clearly see that the Basque Country was indeed colonized by Spain. Are you Keith going to tell us that the USA has been there since the dawn of times?

Some local politicians worry that the insistence on Basque language makes any type of reconciliation between separatists and Spain impossible. "Everything young Basques later encounter in life -- like the fact they live in Spain -- then appears to be an imposition from Madrid," says Santiago Abascal, a regional deputy from the Popular Party who campaigns against the linguistic policy. "That creates frustration that keeps violence bubbling in the Basque Country," he says.

One question Keith, what violence are you talking about?

For more than five hundred years Spain has been using violence to perpetuate their grip of the colonized land. How are the Basques responsible for that violence?

But back in the classroom, most of the frustration seems to be with the dense grammar, forthcoming exams, and the difficulty of finding quality shows on Basque TV.

Arantza Goikolea, Ms. Esquivias's teacher, leads a class through an exercise about their daily routines. Tamara Alende, 25, watches a lot of TV at night, she says in pidgin Euskera.

"Basque shows?" asks Ms. Goikolea. Ms. Alende lowers her head and turns red. "No, Spanish series," she mumbles, to a chorus of boos from the teacher and the rest of the class.

Write to Keith Johnson at keith.johnson@wsj.com

So Keith, these are the reasons why you have been designated Basque-phobe of the week.

~ ~ ~

Basque Cinema's Day

Puente de la Zurriola y Kursaal
Originally uploaded by Tepanahui

This note was published by EITb:

Zinemaldia

Next 26 of September to celebrate Basque Cinema’s Day

09/18/2007

Celebrated since 1997 in the frame of the Cinema Festival of San Sebastián, the Day of Basque Cinema is a tribute to the film creation in the Basque Country.

This event, organised by IBAIA and the Cinema Festival of San Sebastián, also has the collaboration of EITB, EAB Association of Basque Actors, Culture department of the Basque Government, Basque film library and the Newspaper Berria

The Day of Basque Cinema presents a day dedicated to the promotion and exhibition of the last Basque productions. They are showed in the cinema “Principes”, where works from different genres can be seen: animation, fiction, documentaries, short films and some important contribution from the Basque Film Library.

But, the Day of Basque Cinema is also a meeting day for experts in this area, where they give three awards: IBAIA award, which pays tribute to production and/or audiovisual initiative; and AMALUR award, for important people in this area, which this year AMALUR awards will be for the musician and composer Alberto Iglesias; and finally Berria award, given to the best short film made in Basque language.

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A Festival For Kids Too

Kursaal
Originally uploaded by fc_urola

EITB published a note regarding the chance that children will have to join in the events of the upcoming Zinemaldi in Donostia:

San Sebastian Film Festival

Children will enjoy three films in Basque at the Zinemaldi

09/13/2007

Over 20,000 children will attend the morning screenings of ‘Ice Age’ on the giant Velodrome screen. ‘Piccolo & Saxo’ and ‘Vinnare Och Förlorare’ will be displayed at the Take Your Parents to the Cinema screenings.

Kids will also star in the Donostia-San Sebastian Festival with two initiatives encouraging a first approach to films the big way. While it is possible to watch films in an increasing number of manners turning their attention towards ever smaller portable formats, the magic of enjoying cinema on the big screen is also an unbeatable experience for the new generations, the viewers of the future, offering them their first contact with the Film Festival.

With Big Films for the Kids, over 20,000 children will enjoy the morning screenings at the Velodrome, where Ice Age will be shown on the giant screen installed for the event. Pupils from the Basque ikastolas and schools in Gipuzkoa therefore participate in a unique experience, that of watching a film in a theatre for 3,000 viewers, with extraordinary dimensions, an event which has now been a huge success for years at the Donostia-San Sebastian Festival.

Moreover, children also have the opportunity to do things their way: Take Your Parents to the Cinema is an initiative permitting the whole family to participate in screenings with tickets at the very special low price of €1, giving them the chance to discover European premieres. Piccolo, Saxo et Compagnie (Piccolo & Saxo) and Vinnare Och Förlorare are the two films to be screened under this initiative at the Principal Theatre on the 29th.

All three films will be screened dubbed into Basque especially for the occasion, thus permitting their distribution to other Gipuzkoan towns and villages in the future.

Similarly, the Velodrome will house the screening in a version dubbed into Basque of ARCTIC TALE, by Sarah Robertson and Adam Ravetch, a documentary for a family audience showing the effects of the climate change in the Arctic by following a family of polar bears and another of walruses.

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Medem Is Back

Is good to know that Medem is back after being crucified by the Spanish extreme right for his effort to facilitate dialogue among the main political players in the Basque conflict. Here you have a note by Reuters about his return:

Spanish director Medem back after film therapy

Tue Aug 21, 2007 1:36pm EDT

By Elisabeth O'Leary

MADRID (Reuters Life!) - The last time Spanish director Julio Medem made a film -- a documentary about the thorny subject of the Basque region -- the political lashing he got sent him into depression.

The prize-winning director sought refuge in a new feature, "Caotica Ana" (Chaotic Ana), and the result, about a young artist who has flashbacks linking her to women who lived in more difficult times, opens in Madrid this week.

"The depression I went through was four years ago ... partly I made (Caotica Ana) because of it, and the film pulled me out of it," he told reporters on Tuesday.

Medem's previous film, "The Basque Ball" (2003), aimed to encourage dialogue in the Basque region where ETA guerrillas seeking a separate nation have long dominated the agenda.

The conservative government of the time was fiercely opposed to dialogue and slated Medem for giving voice to the guerrillas, alongside those of ETA victims. The Basque Ball went on to win a European film award for best documentary.

Caotica Ana was a respite from that storm, and the subject matter was inspired by his sister Ana, a budding artist who died in her early twenties and whose paintings feature on screen.

Also scripted by Medem, it looks at the layers of experience of young artist Ana (Manuela Velles), who leaves her protected upbringing on the island of Ibiza and sets out to discover her potential under the patronage of Justine (Charlotte Rampling) in Madrid.

She discovers she has the key to past lives, one of them lived during the Western Sahara conflict, in which Morocco annexed the mineral-rich region in 1975.

The Basque director, nominated for top prizes at the Venice and Berlin festivals in the 1990s for films such as "The Lovers of the Arctic Circle" (1998), said that the situation of the Saharawi people, thousands of whom still seek independence, is one of "absolute injustice."

"I didn't include it as a political thing, but rather as a human thing. (How it is understood politically) depends on what it is used for, and I'm prepared for that, because I have experience," he joked.

Caotica Ana is due to be shown at the Toronto Film Festival later this year.

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Orson Wells in Euskal Herria II

This is a segment of a documentary that Orson Wells produced about the Basque Country.

The segment shows a bit of the everyday life in Iparralde, the northern Basque Country. But pay attention to the last few minutes when it goes into the part that the Basques played in WWII, specially the very end when it describes how a young boy was tortured by the Nazis to obtain information about the boy's father who was in charge of smuggling Allied pilots, political dissidents and Jewish children into the southern Basque Country were they would be transferred to England.

I mention this because you will not find any information about this in the Yad Vashem nor the Simon Wiesenthal Center.

~ ~ ~

Glimpses of Euskal Herria

Here you have a nice documentary about Euskal Herria:

~ ~ ~

Orson Wells in Euskal Herria I

Thanks to You Tube here comes a segment of the documentary that Orson Wells shot in Euskal Herria.

Here it is:

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Euskadi and the Spanish "Civil War"

This note comes to us thanks to EITb:

READY IN 2008

Basque Government preparing guide on Civil War

10/04/2006

The Direction of Cultural Heritage of the Culture Department of the Basque Government will publish a Guide of Documentary and Bibliographic Sources of the Civil War in the Basque Country in 2008. The project is within the plan of the Interdepartmental Commission to commemorate the 70th anniversary of the Civil War.

The Culture, Youth and Sports vice-councillor, Gurutz Larrañaga, and the vice-president of Basque Studies Association, Jon Kortazar, have presented this initiative today in Bilbao. Professor José Luis de la Granja Sainz directs the project, which is being elaborated in the History-Geography section of the Basque Studies Association by six Civil War experts who have worked with archives, bibliographies and documents very often.

This source guide covers the whole period of the Civil War, from July 18, 1936 until April 1, 1939 and includes the territories of Alava, Bizkaia and Gipuzkoa. However, documentary sources are not limited to these provinces, they also include those in the Spanish State and abroad.

As the managers noted, this publication is "pioneering" since "it hardly has precedents of the Civil War" and "there is no similar guide, so wide, in any autonomous region."

The Guide of Documentary and Bibliographic Sources was designed as "an essential tool" for all historical investigations of this period and facilitates the search of information on Civil War victims, necessary for survivors and their descendants, who requested the compensation passed by a Basque Government Decree.

The calendar designed contemplates the definitive writing of the guide for 2008, with an introduction and several indexes, and the preparation of its edition as a book.

~ ~ ~

The Basque Brits

Infamous Basque-phobe Colin Davis is simply going to love this one.

I found out about it thanks to a blog called The Duck of Minerva on a post titled "Who Are the British?" which directed me to the original source, what I believe is a magazine published in England called Prospect and its special report "Myths of British Ancestry" by Stephen Oppenheimer.

Here you have the parts that are pertinent to this blog:

The genetic evidence shows that three quarters of our ancestors came to this corner of Europe as hunter-gatherers, between 15,000 and 7,500 years ago, after the melting of the ice caps but before the land broke away from the mainland and divided into islands. Our subsequent separation from Europe has preserved a genetic time capsule of southwestern Europe during the ice age, which we share most closely with the former ice-age refuge in the Basque country. The first settlers were unlikely to have spoken a Celtic language but possibly a tongue related to the unique Basque language.

Another wave of immigration arrived during the Neolithic period, when farming developed about 6,500 years ago. But the English still derive most of their current gene pool from the same early Basque source as the Irish, Welsh and Scots. These figures are at odds with the modern perceptions of Celtic and Anglo-Saxon ethnicity based on more recent invasions. There were many later invasions, as well as less violent immigrations, and each left a genetic signal, but no individual event contributed much more than 5 per cent to our modern genetic mix.

And:

De Jubainville's Celtic myth has been deconstructed in two recent sceptical publications: The Atlantic Celts: Ancient People or Modern Invention by Simon James (1999), and The Celts: Origins, Myths and Inventions by John Collis (2003). Nevertheless, the story lingers on in standard texts and notably in The Celts, a Channel 4 documentary broadcast in February. "Celt" is now a term that sceptics consider so corrupted in the archaeological and popular literature that it is worthless.

This is too drastic a view. It is only the central European homeland theory that is false. The connection between modern Celtic languages and those spoken in southwest Europe during Roman times is clear and valid. Caesar wrote that the Gauls living south of the Seine called themselves Celts. That region, in particular Normandy, has the highest density of ancient Celtic place-names and Celtic inscriptions in Europe. They are common in the rest of southern France (excluding the formerly Basque region of Gascony), Spain, Portugal and the British Isles. Conversely, Celtic place-names are hard to find east of the Rhine in central Europe.

Also:

A picture thus emerges of the dark-ages invasions of England and northeastern Britain as less like replacements than minority elite additions, akin to earlier and larger Neolithic intrusions from the same places. There were battles for dominance between chieftains, all of Germanic origin, each invader sharing much culturally with their newly conquered indigenous subjects.

So, based on the overall genetic perspective of the British, it seems that Celts, Belgians, Angles, Jutes, Saxons, Vikings and Normans were all immigrant minorities compared with the Basque pioneers, who first ventured into the empty, chilly lands so recently vacated by the great ice sheets.

There you have it, the English are direct descendants of Euskal Herria, maybe now they understand how deep their betrayal of the Basques at the end of WWII runs.

~ ~ ~

On the Eve of September 11th

The Miami Herald published an article about the lack of artistic ways by US artists that deal with the September 11th demolition of the World Trade Center and the partial destruction of one of the five sides that comprise the Pentagon.

The author somehow compares this event with the bombing of Gernika and it comes to a logic conclusion, is there a Picasso "Guernica" for September 11th?

Is there?

Is there a Picasso to remember the fall of the Catalonyan Republic to Franco, Hitler and Mussolini?

The Republic of Catalonya was after all, founded on September 11th of 1931, a fact that many Spaniards want us to forget today.

Is there a Picasso to remember the military coup against the Chilean government which ended with the murder of Salvador Allende?

We can not allow ourselves to forget that it was the USA the force behind this event that also took place on a September 11, an event that would usher an era of terror and death for the Chilean society at the hands of Augusto Pinochet.

Here you have an excerpt of the article:

Apocalypse now: Sept. 11's influence on arts and entertainment.

Posted on Sun, Sep. 10, 2006

BY EVELYN McDONNELL

emcdonnell@MiamiHerald.com

On April 26, 1937, German and Italian planes bombed the Basque city of Guernica, killing hundreds -- probably thousands -- of mostly women, children and the elderly and almost completely destroying the non-military town. It was a bombing with no strategic purpose except to inflict horror and oblivion on a civilian population: Guernica was Ground Zero of modern terrorist warfare.

Within three months, Pablo Picasso had memorialized the fascist slaughter with perhaps his greatest painting. Today, when we think ''Guernica,'' we think of the artist's Cubist evocation of agony -- those twisted, turning human forms -- and then of the ghastly evisceration that inspired it.

Five years after three planes crashed into the World Trade Center and Pentagon, destroying buildings, killing thousands and shattering the American psyche, the worlds of art and entertainment still have not come to terms with the terrible events of Sept. 11, 2001. There have been efforts, forays, angles, documentations. But, ''is there a Guernica for 9/11?'' asks documentary photographer Joel Meyerowitz, creator of the book Aftermath: World Trade Center Archive. "I don't think so.''

Maybe Meyerowitz is not asking the right question: ''Should there be a Guernica for 9/11?'' Is the absence of a definitive piece capturing that day a failure on the part of 21st century artists, or an act of honoring?

Comparing 9/11 to Guernica is somewhat unfair. Picasso, after all, didn't have to compete with CNN. In the era of 24-hour instant news, the arts don't have the same opportunity to shape our perception of world events: They reel to keep up, to make sense of the senseless, to tap into feeling in a world overloaded with information. A captivated (or, perhaps, captive) audience experienced 9/11 as a mediated event as it happened, unfolding in real time on millions of TVs -- individualized by our own phone calls to loved ones, or by our proximity to Ground Zero. For miles and months around Manhattan, noses confirmed what eyes saw on small screens -- or you could watch the smoke yourself, atop buildings from Brooklyn to New Jersey.

It's not a day anyone wants to relive, or see sentimentalized, commercialized, exploited

Continues...

I want to tell one thing to Evelyn McDonnell and Joel Meyerowitz. You insult the memory of those who died in Gernika on that day.

There should never be a "Guernica" to remember September 11 because the painting by Picasso was and is an indictment against the fascist powers that conducted that massacre. September 11th was used by fascist minded US citizens to install an extreme right government in an already arrogant and meddling nation. George Bush, Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld are today's Hitler and his henchmen. Tony Blair and the dethroned José María Aznar are Bush's Franco and Mussolini. September 11th was used by the US military as an excuse to attack and destroy Afghanistan and Irak directly and to continue to suffocate Lebanon and Palestine with the proxy Israeli army.

So the answer is no, there should never ever be a "Guernica" to commemorate the day the extreme right (supported by the oil money of the Saudi Arabs) decided to take the USA into a new era of imperialism and global domination. If anything, you can compare September 11 with the alleged attack by the Polish army against a German radio station back in 1939.

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Pete Camino

The Billings Gazette published an excellent article on Pete Camino, sort of an icon for the Basque community in the USA, here it is:

Basque sheep rancher clings to tradition

By ED KEMMICK
Of The Gazette Staff

BUFFALO - Any way you look at it, Pete Camino is an unusual man. He is one of a dwindling number of people in the U.S. who still speak Basque, the language of the fiercely independent people of mysterious origin who inhabit the western Pyrenees of France and Spain.

He is also a Wyoming sheep rancher at a time when they are becoming as rare as Basque speakers.

And he is something of a movie star. A showing of "The Last Link," which chronicles Camino's journey back to the land of his parents, will be a highlight of the Sheep Wagon Festival in Buffalo this weekend.

The Bighorn Basque Club will host the event, which is the annual convention and festival of the North American Basque Organization. There will be dances, concerts, a bike race, a sheep-wagon parade, Basque athletic competitions and lots of Basque food.

Camino is aware of the role he'll play during the festival.

"I'm the grand old man," he said. "It's hell getting old."

Camino was born in Buffalo in 1918 to John and Marie Camino, both natives of Basque country, sometimes called Basqueland. Pete Camino's wife, Genevieve, said Pete's father, like so many other Basques, was brought over to Wyoming by John Esponda, who used to be known locally as "King of the Basques." Esponda's brother, Jean, was actually the first Basque to settle in the Buffalo area, but Jean soon returned to the old country and Esponda stayed on to help build what would be a thriving Basque community.

The Camino ranch was on Sand Creek, about four miles northwest of Buffalo. Like all the other sheep ranchers then, in Buffalo and the old country, the Caminos took their flocks into the mountains during the summer, trailing them on foot and on horseback.

Pete Camino said his family used to take 1,200 head of sheep up into the Bighorn National Forest in what is now the Cloud Peak Wilderness. His father usually hired relatives of his - old bachelors for the most part - to work as herders. Camino's job as camp tender was to deliver supplies to the sheepherders. He'd go into the mountains by pickup and then ride the last 10 miles or so on horseback.

He'd go back and forth all summer, helping out on the ranch most of the time and going up to the mountains once or twice a week. He spoke Basque with the herders, tough men who, with .30-30 rifles at their sides, "just shot the hell out of" coyotes and any other predators that came after the sheep, Camino said.

Basque spoken here

Camino's family moved into Buffalo when he was 7 so he and his younger sister, Anita, could go to school. Genevieve said her husband spoke only Basque at home and that when he started school, "he couldn't talk English, so he spent two years in first grade." Camino tells his own story about Genevieve, who is not Basque. Years ago, a Basque sheepherder who was working for Pete Camino said he'd teach Genevieve Basque if she'd teach him English.

"He got to talking English," Camino said, "but she never learned Basquo. That's quite a lingo." Around Buffalo, "Basquo" (pronounced "bask-o") is commonly used to denote both the language and Basque people.

In 1948, Camino and his father became partners on a ranch on what is known as the Tisdale Divide, about six miles south of Buffalo. Camino has been there ever since, with children and grandchildren now scattered around the area on neighboring ranches.

There was a steady influx of Basques to the U.S. in the 1940s and '50s, many of them escaping the turmoil of the Spanish Civil War (1937-39) and World War II and the collapsed economy that followed the war. But as the sheep industry declined in the U.S. and the economy of the Basque provinces became one of the strongest in Europe, immigration slowly dwindled.

A combination of factors hammered the sheep industry over the years, Camino said. Prices for lamb and wool declined steadily, and at the same time it became more difficult to deal with predators, some of which were listed as threatened or endangered species.

Then, with the drop in immigration, herders became harder and harder to find. Camino said the last shepherd from the old country probably came to Buffalo 30 years ago. A huge blow to the industry was the late-spring blizzard of 1984. It killed thousands of ewes and newborn lambs, and few sheep ranchers in Johnson County, of which Buffalo is the county seat, survived the disaster.

"I'm about the only one in Johnson County running sheep," Camino said.

That combination - Camino's Basque heritage and his status as a dying breed of agriculturalist - is what led Tim Kahn to make a movie about him.

In love with the land

Kahn, a native of Northern California who has taught French in Vermont for more than 30 years, discovered Basqueland, as well as the closely related culture of the Bearn region of France, as a college junior studying abroad in 1964-65. He fell in love with the landscape and the people and hoped to write a book about the region someday.

He and his wife lived there one summer, and they returned to France at least once a year for many years, amassing hundreds of photographs and hours and hours of interviews. The book never got written, but six years ago, Tim Kahn's son Ben, a budding filmmaker, suggested creating a documentary on the Basque and Bearn. The movie was going to focus only on the old country until, by chance, Tim Kahn learned there were a lot of Basque and Bearnaise immigrants in the wine country of Northern California.

He started asking around, wondering whether there were any Basques still following the sheepherding culture, when he was told about an old sheepman in the mountains of northern Wyoming. Things moved quickly after that. Tim Kahn talked to Pete Camino by phone and then traveled to Buffalo, where Camino took him around town, introducing him to many of Buffalo's Basque elders.

"I called Ben that day and said, 'Oh, my Lord, I can see these people on the screen,' " Tim Kahn said.

They decided the movie would look at loss - the loss of a culture and a way of life here and in the old country. The film opens with scenes of one of the last movements of sheep on foot in a valley of the Pyrenees, while Pete Camino represents one of the last of a breed in the U.S.

The movie took another twist when Camino expressed an interest in finally going back to see the land where his parents were born. Kahn raised the money for the trip, and in 2001 Pete and Genevieve, accompanied by several children and grandchildren, went to Basque country for the first time.

It was all the more poignant that their trip coincided with a mass reunion of Caminos in Arneguy, the village in southern France where Camino's mother was born. They also traveled to the birthplace of Camino's father, on the other side of the mountains in Spain.

Sheep for milk, horses for meat

Camino, ever the practical sheepman, was most interested to find that in the old country, the Basques raised sheep almost exclusively for their milk, which they used to make cheese. He was also surprised to learn that they raised horses for their meat.

Through Tim Kahn's connection with Vermont Sen. Patrick Leahy, Kahn got in touch with Willie Nelson, the country music star and longtime advocate of family farms. Nelson ended up narrating the film, free of charge, and "The Last Link" was completed in 2003. The movie premiered in Buffalo that year and had its European premiere in the Parliament chambers of Navarre, France.

Kahn and Camino will be on hand for another showing of it this weekend during the festival, Friday at 4 p.m. in the Buffalo Theatre.

Camino's opinion on the movie is characteristically matter of fact. "I was real surprised," he said. "I didn't think it would work out that damn good."

Camino said he wouldn't mind going back to Basque country one more time, but meanwhile he does his small part to maintain some aspects of Basque culture in Buffalo. He still speaks Basque with a few old friends - "When they get to talking Basquo, they're just showing off," Genevieve says - and he still makes lukanka, a Basque sausage that Genevieve described as "hotter than blazes and full of garlic."

And of course he still raises sheep, though no shepherds watch over them in the mountains anymore. They are hauled by semitrailer to fenced-in pastures in the Bighorns.

It's not a bad time to be a sheep rancher, Camino said. Although the land around Buffalo is drier than he's ever seen it, prices for lambs and wool are strong, and two of his sons are in line to carry on the family tradition.

"We had some cows, but I sold 'em," Camino said. "I'm not a cowboy. I just like sheep, I guess."

I strongly recomend viewing the documentary "The Last Link", it is an amazing labour of love by the film makers involved in the project.

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