Basque Versus Basque

The Basque Autonomous Police (Ertzaintza) in full riot gear faced Batasuna supporters outside their party's headquarters in Bilbo August 27, 2002. Police breached human barricades and seized offices of the pro-independence Basque party Batasuna in three Basque cities on Tuesday, enforcing a Spanish judge's order to shut it down.

And this is what happens when the international community hides behind its blindfold, this is what happens when people that goes around talking about freedom and democracy overlook the doings of a pseudo democratic government that when faced with the reality of having failed in their goal to completely impose their culture and ways on a nation that they control today thanks to the decitions made by the two fascist monsters of the last century decides to attack the very foundation of democracy and bans a political party for alleged ties to a terrorist group.

What about banning the PSOE for creating the GAL?

And what is the GAL some people will ask. The GAL is a terrorist group created by the PSOE when they were the head of the Spanish government.

But hey, who cares?

At the end, it is the Basques. Basques will die due to the violence that this Nazi wannabe regime has created by banning a political party that represents 100,000 people. But is only the Basques, they are not as important as let say, the Jews. The Basques are not mentioned in the Bible, therefore God never gave them that land they claim despite them living in that land for the last 5,000 years. Who cares if someone decides to take their land and destroy their culture? They don't even have kosher food!

800,000 out of 1'200,000 people voted for pro-independence Basque parties in the Basque Autonomous Community alone last year, you do the math about the percentage. So do not ever give me that fucking stupid lie again about Basques not longing for their independence. Have you ever considered how many ethnic Basques are among the 400,000 that voted for the other parties? Would you consider the vote of a Chinese when it comes to the independence of Tibet? Or the opinion of a Serb when it comes to the independence of Kosovo? Or whatever a murderous Indonesian had to say about the freedom of East Timor? Would you rely on Saddam Hussein to decide the fate of the Kurds?

If the international community turns its back to the Basques this time, they will be taking responsability for what happened in 1936, and what has been going on ever since. The international community will become an instrument of fascist policies, the same policies that 50 years ago murdered millions of Gypsies, Slavs and Jews.

And someone said "Never Again", yeah sure, whatever.

Before I go, that fascist puppet named Baltasar Garzón, one of the masterminds behind all this violence, has been nominated for the Noble Peace Prize. Maybe they should give a posthumous Nobel Peace Prize to Hitler and Mussolini, and one to Milosevic also, before he hangs for his crimes in Bosnia.

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Batasuna's Ban : European Shame

This press release comes to us thanks to the Basque Diaspora group:

CELTIC LEAGUE PRESS INFORMATION

EUROPE'S SHAME AS BATASUNA BANNED

As expected the Spanish parliament, at a special sitting, has endorsed a ban against the Basque nationalist party, Batasuna

The ban was passed by 295-10 with the ruling party of Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar receiving backing from the opposition Socialists. However, other parties from the Basque, Catalonian, Galician regions either abstained or voted against the motion.

The government, in a bizarre twist to the normal judicial process, will now initiate proceedings seeking an order from the Supreme Court to declare Batasuna illegal. It is expected that this will only be a formality as the Supreme Court is little more than a 'nodding donkey' for the government party.

Already a High Court judge has ordered Batasuna to shut down for three years. The order by Judge Baltasar Garzons effectively shuts all Batasuna offices and businesses and bans the party from holding meetings or calling demonstrations.

The government justifies the move by citing what it says is Batasuna's support for the armed separatist group, ETA.

However, Batasuna denies any formal links with ETA and the government, which claims that the party is a key part of the armed group's fund-raising activities and recruitment operations, has not been able to provide credible evidence to justify its allegations.

A more likely reason for the government action is the success that Batasuna has enjoyed in mobilising Basque youth. This is known to have worried the Aznar government because it indicates that without meaningful progress towards self-determination the young and vibrant political organisation which Batasuna has developed would continue its pressure on the Spanish.

It is an appalling day for democracy in Europe when a political party is banned in this way while European Governments and the European Union maintain a stoney silence.

Bernard Moffatt

Secretary General

Celtic League

26/08/02

The Celtic League has branches in the six Celtic Countries. It works to promote cooperation between these countries and campaigns on a broad range of political, cultural and environmental matters. It focuses on human rights abuse and civil liberty issues and also monitors the impact of military activity.

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Reactions to Ban on Batasuna

Swiss Info published this article regarding some of the reactions elicited by Madrid's decision to ban Batasuna, a Basque political party:

August 25, 2002 - 5:01 AM

Basques ready for fight

By Daniel Flynn

GUERNICA, Spain (Reuters) - "Long live armed ETA" reads graffiti in the People's tavern where militant Basque separatists were seething over Spanish plans to ban their party.

Casually dressed and eloquent, Xabi and Aitor are young activists in this northern Spanish town for Batasuna, a hardline Basque nationalist party which Madrid says is the political wing of ETA.

"We're not criminals like they say in Madrid," Xabi said. "Batasuna is no intermediary for ETA. There are ex-ETA members in the party, but there are also journalists and teachers."

In his toughest move yet against Basque nationalism, Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar has asked the government-controlled congress to seek a judicial ban on Batasuna under a controversial new law which allows the government to ban political parties which do not condemn so-called "terrorism".

As evidence of Batasuna's complicity, Spanish authorities say they have arrested more than 400 active or former Batasuna members for collaborating with the guerrilla group in the 23 years since the leftist party's creation.

Batasuna shares ETA's aim of a Basque homeland in north Spain and southwest France. Its leaders have refused to condemn the armed group for its bombings, assassinations and murders.

While banning Batasuna is popular among Spaniards weary of ETA violence, lawyers have questioned whether the party can be legally sidelined simply for not condemning violence and warned that such a move could infringe the democratic rights of its 140,000 voters -- a tenth of the Basque country's electorate.

Meanwhile, a high court judge has begun proceedings to suspend the party for "apparently forming part of the terrorist complex led by ETA". The judge, whose evidence remains secret, has imposed heavy fines on Batasuna and the so-called People's Taverns where radical nationalists habitually meet.

"Now, there is a war of words because they have not tried to close the taverns, but when they try to do that, there will be conflict," Aitor said.

AZNAR ACCUSED OF FASCISM

Xabi and Aitor have just spent an hour plastering Guernica with posters of swastikas accusing Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar's government of fascism -- an allusion to the oppression of the Basques by General Francisco Franco's 1939-1975 government.

Once the spiritual home of Basque independence -- where Spanish kings swore to uphold Basque liberty, the mountain town has become a symbol of the suppression of Basque nationalism.

Guernica's concrete streets still attest to the infamous 1937 bombing by the German air force requested by Franco to punish Basque support of Republicans in the Spanish Civil War.

Citing Madrid's ban on several radical social groups in recent years for alleged links to ETA violence, nationalists complain of a return to the cultural repression under Franco.

"There are many people outside Batasuna who are worried by this. Today it's us, but tomorrow it may be other nationalist parties, or schools and taverns," said Xabi.

Moderate nationalist politicians talk of a "corridor of communication" between ETA and Batasuna, but they say a ban will do nothing to ease confrontation.

"The government is trying to raise tensions in the Basque country to discredit the nationalist cause," said Gorka Knorr, vice-president of the Basque country's parliament. "Being hard on the Basques is popular with voters in the rest of the Spain."

ETA has killed 41 people in its most recent wave of bloodletting since an ETA cease-fire collapsed two years ago in the face of government unwillingness to cede further autonomy to the Basque region. ETA is on a list of organisations considered by the European Union and the United States to be "terrorists".

Outbreaks of ETA violence in the past have coincided with a decline in Batasuna's electoral fortunes in the Basque country and fuelled outrage in the rest of Spain.

An ETA bomb killed two people, including a six-year-old child this month in the southeastern seaside resort of Santa Pola. The attack and comments from Batasuna leader Arnaldo Otegi provided Aznar with the political impetus to begin fast-track proceedings to ban the party.

Otegi, a former ETA member, outraged Spaniards by blaming the Santa Pola killings on Aznar's failure to address Basque grievances and by hinting more deaths would follow.

ETA caused further outcry by threatening to target any party that supports or abstains from Monday's congressional vote -- prompting the government to suggest not just Batasuna, but other Basque groups which oppose the ban, were allies of "terrorism."

"ETA is dragging the leftist wing of Basque nationalism into the abyss," warned Josu Jon Imaz, spokesman for the region's ruling nationalist coalition, which distances itself from Batasuna but relies on it for a majority in the Basque congress.

"IF YOU WANT WAR, YOU CAN HAVE IT"

Thousands of Batasuna supporters at a recent protest against the ban in the nationalist stronghold of San Sebastian chanted "Long live armed ETA" and "If you want war, you can have it".

"The Spanish state is encouraging armed struggle by making political activities impossible," the gimlet-eyed Otegi, who served a jail sentence for kidnapping, told Reuters recently.

Otegi compares the "conflict" in the Basque country with Northern Ireland's 'Troubles', saying Batasuna could perform a role similar to the pro-Republican party Sinn Fein by mediating between government and armed militants.

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Recording Basque Migration

This interesting article about the Basque migration to the US was published at The Augusta Chronicle:

Recordings that capture lives of Basque settlers being made available on Internet

Web posted Friday, August 23, 2002

By Dan Gallagher
Associated Press

BOISE, Idaho -- The Basque immigrants arrived in the American West from Spain and France during the early part of the 20th century, often working in boarding houses and as sheepherders, and later as ranchers.

Generations later, their descendants can hear the voices of their ancestors and see their faces on the Internet thanks to a history documenting project at the Center for Basque Studies at the University of Nevada in Reno and the Basque Museum and Cultural Center in Boise.

"They can actually hear their ancestors or relatives," said Jill Berner, a spokeswoman for the Reno center. "What a fabulous thing for a young Basque American girl to hear her grandmother talk about her experiences."

For years, the Boise museum and the Reno center have interviewed Basques and the hundreds of records are being converted to a digital format for the Internet.

The Web sites also include photographs, immigration documents and wedding certificates. The effort is called "Oroitzapenak," which is Basque for "Memories."

"They had fantastic experiences in their lives. We have social questions: Why did they leave the Basque country? What are their origins?" said Gloria Totoricaguena, an assistant professor in Reno.

The Basque immigrants came from a region straddling the Pyrenees Mountains. Today, the Boise area has the largest Basque population in North America with 15,000 people.

But the number of surviving Basque immigrants in the West is dwindling and their children are getting older.

Some lived through calamitous events including the Spanish Civil War's 1937 bombing of Guernica, their spiritual capital. German bombers flying on behalf of Francisco Franco dropped 130,000 pounds of explosives and reduced the village to rubble.

Within five years, Totoricaguena said she will travel to the Basque country to interview the people left behind by their friends and relatives who moved away.

"There's a sense of urgency to record these people," Totoricaguena said. "The ones who were old enough to remember the bombing are now almost getting too old to remember."

The immigrants tended to move to areas where friends and relatives preceded them. Many of the French Basques ended up in San Francisco. Boise's population is mainly from the Spanish province of Viscaya, which includes Guernica.

While Basques started migrating to America in the 1800s, it is this generation which is setting down their families' stories, Miller said.

"It's like many ethnic groups," Miller said. "Grandfather chooses to forget his roots. The first generation is just trying to feed their families. The second generation is playing football and eating chorizo sausages. The third generation is looking back at their history."

On the Net:

Basque Museum oral histories

Center for Basque Studies at the University of Nevada, Reno

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Basque Archelogical Site in California

Yes indeed, believe it or not.

Well, maybe you should know that Basques were roaming the American West at least a hundred years before the fundamentalist religious maniacs that got on board of the Mayflower even dreamed of going to America to dine on stuffed turkey and sweet potatoes.

But this is not that old.

Just in case you want more info about this topic, here you have it:

Sheep Camp Restorations

Whisky Creek Sheep Camp

Located in the Granite Chief Wilderness area of Tahoe National Forest, California, the Whiskey Creek Sheep Camp consists of two beautiful log cabins and an outdoor bread oven. The cabins were built in 1954-55 by Severino Ibarra (Nafarroa) and Pete Bengoetxea (Bizkaia). The bread oven was constructed by Valerio Zubiri (Nafarroa).

In accordance with certain laws governing wilderness areas, the camp was slated to be demolished. However, Tahoe archaeologists Carmel Miesenbach and Susan Rose took up the cause of the camp. Historian Jose Mallea wrote an evaluation of the camp’s significance, and Rose presented the case to the California State Historical Preservation Office. To make a long story short, the camp was declared historically significant and became eligible for federal protection.

In the summer of 1992 a crew from Euskal Telebista, the Basque television station, joined Mallea and archaeologists Richard Markley and Carrie Smith for the 3.5 hour hike to the camp. The interview recorded there was later aired in Euskadi.

The camp was in need of restoration and caretaking. A large tree had fallen across the roof of one cabin, and the lower cabin logs were rotting and needed to be replaced. The Forest Service wondered if the Basque community would volunteer to help with repairs and future upkeep of the site. Jose Mallea acted as an intermediary between the Forest Service and North American Basque Organizations (NABO) representative Jesús Pedroarena, and after months of negotiations, in the spring of 1994, Bob Echeverria, President of NABO, signed an agreement with the Tahoe National Forest Service to formalize the relationship.

Wheeler Sheep Camp

The completion of the restoration of the oven at the Wheeler Sheep Camp in Kyburz Flat, Tahoe National Forest in 1993, meant the preservation of another piece of Basque history in the West. The effort began in 1992 when Michael Baldrica, archaeologist for the Tahoe National Forest approached Jose Mallea with the idea for the restoration. Mallea took the project on, along with volunteers Javier Cillero, Erik Mallea, Analiese and Kirk Odenkranz, Abel and Judy Mendegia, Marc Ugalde, David Grippo and others. Forest Service personnel also participated in the project.

Martin Gallues ran the camp from around 1915 into the 1950s, and dozens of other Basque herders worked there from the turn of the century to the 1970s. They carved their names and the dates of their stay on the trunks of the aspen trees in nearby groves.

Wheeler Sheep Camp is now a Special Events Picnic Area and eventually it will be equipped with restrooms, running water, and similar amenities. The oven is a “working oven,” and civic groups may reserve it for a fee. Several events have taken place there, including a picnic and barbecue for Forest Service personnel, various speeches, and an exhibition of Basque dancing by the Zenbat Gara cultural organization of the University of Nevada. If your group wishes to reserve the picnic area for an event, call the Forest Service in Sierraville, California (phone: 916-994-3401).

(Professor Jose Mallea is currently working to create a videotape and photographic record of carvings left by Basque sheepherders on aspen trees in the American West. Mallea’s research has meant that records left by sheepherders in the Cottonwood Creek area were saved for posterity before those groves were destroyed in the Cottonwood fire of August 1993. He has also completed research in an area to the east of Lake Tahoe where logging has begun. Mallea also travels the West giving lectures and slide shows about the aspen tree carvings.)

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Farewell to Txillida

Some bad news from Euskal Herria, one of its greatest artist, Eduardo Txillida has died.

Here you have the article by the BBC dedicated to him:

Basque sculptor Chillida dies

Monday, 19 August, 2002, 23:56 GMT 00:56 UK

Spain's most important modern sculptor, Eduardo Chillida, has died at the age of 78.

The Basque-born artist passed away in his sleep at his home in San Sebastian on Monday after a prolonged battle with pneumonia and Alzheimer's disease.

His career saw him become one of Europe's best-known artists and his trademark giant metal sculptures were erected in places as far afield as Berlin and Texas.

In the sculptor's beloved San Sebastian, the flag on the city hall was lowered to half-mast to mourn his death.

"This had to come, we were all expecting it," said his son, Luis Chillida. "He did not suffer, but simply slipped into sleep and stayed that way."

Winner of prestigious international prizes and a member of arts academies worldwide, Chillida designed a giant monument to German reunification near the Chancellery in Berlin: two cast-iron hands weighing 88 tonnes.

In Spain, he is perhaps best remembered for his Comb of the Wind - twisted, tree-like sculptures on the coast at San Sebastian. The work featured on the now-defunct peseta coins.

Demonstrators for peace in the Basque region, where a separatist struggle with Madrid has left more than 800 people dead since 1968, have often used the monument as a focus for their rallies.

Eduardo Chillida is due to be cremated on Tuesday and his ashes interred at the Chillida Museum in the Basque town of Hernani.

Noticed how they used the infamous 800 paragraph for an article about a Basque artist?

This tells you just how deep the hatred against the Basques runs in those who call the shots in the media corporations and how desperate they are to make friends with a Fascist like Aznar.

By the way, you have to excuse the BBC for not spelling his last name correctly, sadly they put the politics above the identity of a people with its own history and identity, that is why they spell it as Chillida.

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Euskera Written Holly Book

No, it is not a holly book that tells the world that Euskal Herria is the Basque promised land. It is actually more simple than that.

This is about a note appeared at the Center for Basque Studies's web site about the different versions that can be found of the Bible translated to Euskara, the Basque Language.

Here it is:

The Bible in Basque

By Jacques Bellay

In 1571 Joannes Leizarrga, a Catholic priest from Zuberoa, joined the Protestant Reform movement and undertook the translation of the New Testament into Basque for the first time. The Roman Church set their sights on the task in 1740 when Haraneder produced his translation of the New Testament. More recently, in 1976 the abbot Kerexeta translated the Bible into Bizkaian.

Meanwhile, a new ecumenical translation of the Bible into Basque has appeared in bookstores under the title Elizen Arteko Biblia, published by the Sociedades B¡blicas Unidas, an organization that includes both Protestants and Catholics in the Basque Country.

This book is sturdily bound and contains all sorts of interesting information at the end of the volume, such as twenty pages of interdialectical vocabulary, thirty pages of Biblical dictionary, a subject index, plus maps and a timetable of Biblical history compared with general history of the period.

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Herrialde Number Eight

This has to do with the old Basque equation 4 + 3 = 1.

Meaning the seven provinces are one country.

Well, as it happens, there is one more province (herrialde). Where's that other province.

Simple, it is the one comprised by all the Basques that are members of the Basque Diaspora, the dispersion all over the globe (not only the USA).

This is a report on the issue that appeared at the web page for the Center of Basque Studies at the University of Nevada in Reno:

The Eighth Basque Province

By IEPA!

(One of the reasons I wanted to come to the U.S. was to see the Basque people here and get to know their way of life. I wanted to know if it is possible to call these second-, third- and fourth-generation Basque-Americans “Basques.” This article is my answer. In the Basque fashion, I sign with my pseudonym, Iepa!)

Does the eighth Basque province exist? If so, where is it? These are excellent questions. We are clearly Seven in One, but up till now we have fallen short of forming that One, that eighth province. Where can it be?

It is not easy to locate, not is it easy to explain, but even if it's not official, there is an eighth province.

Soon our time will be up and we will gladly set foot once again on the soil of Euskalherria.

You may be asking, what is she talking about? Where is this so-called eighth province? Well, this province cannot be located geographically or politically. It is a province of feeling.

We find it in the mountains of the American West, in the aspen carvings; we find it in the desert mine shafts and in the dances, in Gardnerville's Song Competition and in the summer festivals.

Yes! This province is made up of places in America! Here is Lekeitio Street, and there is Ascuaga's famous hotel, and here we have the dancers, whirling, twirling, jo ta ke. “Step, step, bat, bi, hiru, aurrera!” “Let's go, guys!” all mixed up together, dancing the Behenafarroa march and the Bizkaian expatadantza. The effort is there and you can't deny their energy. The dances express how Basque they feel, it's not a bad thing, and they demonstrate their inner being as best they can.

Not far away (in Reno, Nevada) is the Basque Studies Program, thousands of books and Marcelino Ugalde dancing among them, hau hemen and hori hor. And there are more people there. Jill Berner with her soft, calm voice saying, “Kaixo, zer moduz?” Joan Brick with her elegant earrings amidst the paper and the happiness she distributes with the mail between 10:30 and 11:00. And let's not forget Linda White, promoting euskera, the teacher with the heart of gold.

I must not forget to mention coordinator William Douglass, the one seldom seen and seldom spoken to. What can I say about him? Nothing that has not been said before, only to praise his work. Basque professors give glory to this university. In anthropology and history, they make their mark. Joseba Zulaika explains art and steles, and Jose Mallea follows the footsteps of the sheepherders through the peace of the trees and the mountains.

We are the noisy, chatty “Basque colony,” the young people who arrive every year, the ones studying English or Basque, the ones studying at the university.

Perhaps we come from different places in the Basque Country. Undoubtedly, often we would pass each other there and pay no attention to one another, but our language and the fact that we are in a foreign land soon unite us.

Farther to the north (in Boise, Idaho) we find the Bar Gernika and a lot of generous Bizkaians. They are all very happy to welcome people from the Basque Country, eager to hear the news from there.

The young people say they are Americans but they are different somehow from other people. What can it be? They master euskera, they spread Basque dances, and they long to go to the Basque Country. There must be something special there.

There are stonelifters and woodcutters there. Often there are sheepherders, and you can see ox-pulling contests. There is homesickness in the air.

Head for the warmth again, and in California you hear the voices of Iparralde. The txistu and the dance, pelota and trinquette. They are preparing for a Basque festival, having a big meal together.

How can we deny these people their Basqueness? How can we not say that they are building a little Euskalherria piece by piece, albeit a perfect one, an idealized one.

Their feelings are strong, and although their feet and finances are here in America, often their heads and hearts are in the Basque Country and with this, they earn the honor of being part of it.

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Zuberoa

Last but not least, here you have information about the Basque province of Zuberoa.

Zuberoa (also Xiberu or Xüberoa) is a former viscounty and part of the present Iparralde. It is divided into two cantons of the arrondissement (district) of Oloron-Sainte-Marie (Mauleon-Licharre and Tardets-Soraluce), and a part of the canton of Saint Palais (arrondissement of Bayonne).

Its provincial capital is Maule, which fused with Lextarre in 1841 to form "Maule-Lextarre", but today is often known as "Maule". Historically, Zuberoa is the smallest province of the Basque Country (785 sq.km.). Its population has been decreasing.

Geography

The whole territory extends around the axis provided by the river Uhaitza flowing south to north until it joins the Oloron river.

Zuberoa borders:

* in the north with the Oloron river, which divides it from Béarn
* in the east with the Barétous valley in Béarn
* in the south with the Salazar and Roncal valleys in Nafarroa
* in the west with Nafarroa Behera

Zuberoa comprises three geographical areas:

* Pettara in the north
* the forest massif of Arbaila in the west
* Basabürüa in the south, attaining its highest point at 2017 m at the Orhi peak

Culture

After decades of emigration and demographic, social and cultural decay, the territory is showing a strong determination in recovering the lost vitality of centuries ago. Assorted cultural events linked to old traditions bear witness to that dynamism.

There is a tradition of folk musical theatre, the pastoral: the inhabitants of a village spend the year preparing and rehearsing the play and its dances. Traditionally, the subject of the play was Catholic, but recently pieces of Basque history are also presented. Another event akin to the pastoral beloved of the people of Zuberoa is the maskaradas. This theatrical performances are put on in many villages of Zuberoa in carnival time through spring. Each year a specific village takes the responsibility of arranging a new performance. It consists of a music band in due carnival outfit surrounded with a group of set carnivalesque characters and dancers parading up and down the main street of the host village; at the end, they stage an informal play usually in the market place or handball court.

Zuberoa is also renown for its singing tradition, elegant dances and local music instruments, such as xirula and ttun-ttun. These instruments are gaining new dynamism thanks to music schools founded to that end by local cultural activists.

Zuberoa has been a bilingual province for centuries due to the proximity of Béarn, and the Basque souletin dialect has been influenced by the Béarnese romance language. Zuberoan is a dialect of the Basque language spoken in the region.

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English Mercenaries in Spain

So get this one, Aznar is so willing to use the situation created in the aftermath that there is reports he allowed English mercenaries to hunt down IRA and ETA members in Spain (and we guess in Euskal Herria, Catalunya and Galiza too).

Of course, Tony Blair couldn't say no to this opportunity to show the international community his "compromise" with the "war on terror", an euphemism being used these days to refer to the loss of locks in different countries that were there to protect the human rights and the civil liberties of their citizens.

Here you have the article published at The Telegraph:

British unit in Spain to track Eta and IRA

By Isambard Wilkinson in Madrid

Last Updated: 11:15PM BST 31 Jul 2002

A highly secret British military unit is operating on Spanish territory gathering intelligence on links between the IRA and Eta, the Basque separatist organisation.

The Telegraph has learned that a special task force including serving and former members of 14 Intelligence Company, a unit closely linked to the SAS, has been on the ground for some time, apparently with Spanish government approval.

According to a military intelligence official, the use of 14 Int was "highly unusual as intelligence work there would normally be carried out by other branches [of the intelligence services]".

The deployment of British troops in operations on the territory of a major European state is likely to have been agreed at the highest level. The intelligence official described it as "highly sensitive".

One intelligence expert expressed surprise at the use of the unit.

"It is a bizarre notion that 14 Int are in Spain operationally," he said, suggesting that MI5 would normally be expected to cover operations connected to the IRA.

In normal circumstances, the unit would monitor terrorist movements on British territory then hand over to Spain's intelligence service if the need arose.

But Spain has been making increasingly vociferous demands for foreign help to crush Eta. Since September 11, Jose Maria Aznar, the prime minister, has sought American and European Union aid to end the 34-year-old conflict, which has killed more than 800 people.

Britain has long supported Spanish efforts to crack down on Eta, which is known to have developed close ties with the IRA.

London is also keen to foster Spain as an ally to bolster Britain's influence within the EU. The charm offensive has resulted in wide-ranging concessions over Gibraltar.

Washington is supplying intelligence material to Spain and has sent a team of FBI agents. But the special skills of the British troops would add a new dimension to the internationalisation of the Basque conflict. The unit's expertise lies in its ability to track and listen to suspects' conversations and communications.

The men and women will be seeking details on the close ties between the IRA and Eta, as well as the exchange of terrorist expertise and even arms.

Links between nationalists in Northern Ireland and the Basque country are well-established. Gerry Adams, the Sinn Fein president, has visited the area many times to meet leaders of Batasuna, Eta's political arm.

Detectives in Northern Ireland have been reported as saying that Eta recently shipped fresh stocks of explosives to the IRA, while the republican group gave bomb-making technology to Eta.

The news of increased outside involvement comes at a difficult time for Eta. France, for years a sanctuary for Eta terrorists, has been taking tough action and Jesus Maria Lariz Iriondo, a senior Eta leader, was arrested in Uruguay yesterday.

But the use of some of Britain's elite troops in Spain is sure to bring criticism that Spanish sovereignty has been infringed.

800 casualties due to the political conflict between Euskal Herria and Spain? Obviously nobody is counting those murdered by the Spanish occupation forces with a figure up in the tens of thousands.

And why are the English so eager to comply with the Spaniards when allegedly the peace process with the IRA is going so well?

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