Ibarretxe in Madrid

It did not come as a surprise.

The Spanish Parliament said no to the proposal by Basque Prime Minister to amend the political relationship between the Basque Autonomous Community and Spain.

After a while you learn not to expect much from people clinging to past glories.

Ibarretxe knew that, the Basques knew it also, but this was a magnificent chance to demonstrate to the entire world that the Basques do want a larger amount of freedom and most important of all, they are willing to negotiate, they are comfortable pursuing this dream through democratic institutions.

We have all that hoopla about how the Iraquis went out there and voted, even with the threat of violence by the terrorists.

Yet, when the Basques democratically elect a Prime Minister that promised to propose a new political pact with Madrid, and when that Basque leader actually delivers what he promises peacefully and withing the frame of the law, everyone looks the other way, and some cowards even blemish the will of the majority of Basques with wild accusations that this whole thing demonstrates that there is no moderates among the Basques, that they are only playing the good cop bad cop routine in conjunction with ETA.

Well, today Ibarretxe defended the will of the Basques, he did it with passion, with determination and with intelligence.

It was up to Rajoy to show the true colors of his colleagues at the PP when he said that "the referendum will not be valid even if the 100% of the Basques support it". Some extrange way to perceive democracy I would say.

And Rodriguez Zapatero, who at least has been decent enough to allow the dialogue as opposed to what a Prime Minister puppet to Aznar's designs would have done in the same situation, candidly indicated that "the future of the Basques will be decided by all the Basques, and all the Spaniards". Sure, just like the English decided the independence of the USA and the Portuguese the independence of Brazil.

Ibarretxe

Basque premier Juan Jose Ibarretxe delivers a speech during a special parliamentary session to debate his plan for a 'status of free association' with Spain to the national Parliament in Madrid February 1, 2005. The plan, which the mainstream Socialist and right-of-centre Popular Parties say violates Spain's 1978 constitution, which allows regions a certain degree of autonomy from Madrid, is likely to end in rejection by a wide margin. The ruling Socialists also say the plan divides the Basque country and that it favors violent Basque separatist group ETA. REUTERS/Paul Hanna

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It May Be Coincidence...

But today both Ibarretxe and Batasuna were in Madrid defending the rights of the Basques from the BAC in particular in one case and the Basques from Euskal Herria in general in the other case.

Here are the links to the two notes that were published in Berria:

Ibarretxe to defend New Statute in Spanish Parliament today.

In Madrid Batasuna calls for the wishes of Basques to be respected.

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International Support

Only good things can happen when the world stops looking the other way.

Check this out, it appeared today at Berria:

International group undertakes to vouch for process

The Conflict Resolution Commission has presented its international group during a meeting in Iruñea and has announced who will be taking part

Irene Arrizurieta – IRUÑEA (Pamplona)

The Conflict Resolution Commission (KSB) formed by the Forum for National Debate presented its international group in Iruñea (Pamplona) yesterday. Its function is to “ensure that the process is conducted democratically and scrupulously”. The role of this International Commission will be to oversee and endorse the process to resolve the Basque conflict.

The people responsible for overseeing and endorsing the resolution of the conflict were appointed during yesterday’s meeting in Iruñea. They are Sjurdur Skaale, a former member of the Faroese Parliament;Verena Graf, a Swiss expert in human rights; and the Catalans, Aureli Argemi and Monica Sabata, members of the CIEMEN (Escarré International Centre for Ethnic Minorities and Nations). Alec Reid, the priest who acted as a mediator in the Irish conflict, and Pete Cenarrusa, the former Secretary of State for Idaho, will be responsible for endorsing the work.

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Zanpantzar in Ituren

Zanpantzar

People from the small Spanish Basque village of Iturem, Spain, Monday, Jan. 31, 2005, walk in disguise to frighten the village spirits and to have a good spring harvest, at the start of the holiday of Zampantzar. The Zampantzar holiday is one of the first European Carnival holidays of the season. (AP Photo/Alvaro Barrientos)

He, the people of Yahoo News is calling the town Iturem, with an "m", duh!

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Euskadi in Porto Alegre

Indymedia Euskal Herria has a very interesting recount of the activities by a group of Basques in the Forum of Porto Alegre, go check it out. (Sorry, in Euskera and Spanish only)

Porto Alegre

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Ice in Iruñea

Ice

A climber attempts to climb a rock covered with ice on the side of the NA-1370 road outside Pamplona, Spain Saturday Jan. 29, 2005. Freezing temperatures have gripped northern and central Spain and look likely to continue. (AP Photo/ EFE, Jesus Diges)

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Ibarretxe in Andoain

Andoain 05

Basque premier Juan Jose Ibarretxe addresses the media before a meeting with supporters in the Basque town of Andoain January 29, 2005. Ibarretxe is likely to defend his controversial plan, which would give Spain's Basque region virtual independence from Spain, before Madrid's parliament next week. REUTERS/ Pablo Sanchez /Yahoo News

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Danke!

While the Spaniards stick to the stories that Francisco Franco told, the Germans atone for what happened over 60 years ago.

The official story of what happened in Gernika in 1937 is that it was the Basques the ones that set the town in fire, just because.

The Germans apologized for what the Kondor Legion did a couple of years ago.

Today the went a step forward, they removed the name of one of the pilots from a couple of military installations.

Here is the story from Deutsche Welle:

Germany Army Drops Name of Nazi Pilot

Germany stripped a late fighter pilot's name from two military institutions Friday because his squadron participated in the devastating bombing of the Basque city of Guernica during the Spanish Civil War. A spokesman said Defense Minister Peter Struck decided to remove the name of Werner Mölders from the sites after a television news program revealed last year that the pilot had belonged to Nazi Germany's infamous Condor Legion, which served with Spanish dictator Francisco Franco's forces in the raid. Barracks in the northern town of Visselhoevede and the fighter squadron 74 in the southern town of Neuburg an der Donau will now bear new names, which have not yet been chosen. The lower house of parliament voted in 1998 to no longer allow military sites to carry the names of Condor Legion soldiers. The defense ministry spokesman said Struck had spoken with officials from the German air force and a relative of Mölder before making the decision. The pilot, who was not personally involved in the Guernica raid, died in a crash in 1941 in Poland at the age of 28. The 1937 bombardment, which Pablo Picasso captured in a celebrated painting, killed hundreds of civilians. Franco's forces took the city two days after the atrocity.

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Is Savater Deranged?

I'm thinking that the answer is yes.

He just doesn't know what to say anymore, he is like a rabid lap dog barking at the moon.

Here is his last "piece":

The wolf at the door.

El Pais Spain FERNANDO SAVATER

In our rosy context of "great expectations" and general niceness, would it be acceptable to sound a little note of alarm - a suggestion that the wolf is, if not right at the door, then at least in the neighborhood? I think the alarm was sounded on Saturday by the people who attacked the Defense Minister José Bono and the Euro-parliamentarian Rosa Díez in the demonstration in Madrid convoked by the Association for Victims of Terrorism.

Clearly the rage of this more or less numerous group expressed no righteous ire, but only the frustration of the right wing, lately dislodged from power, and always ready to abuse and pervert the channels of democratic expression in the name of the supposed urgencies of the outraged nation. This abuse was even more inadmissible when directed against leaders of the Socialist Party, which has always maintained a clear, firm line against terrorism.

Unfortunately this is no isolated incident. Some members of the anti-ETA group ¡Basta Ya! already experienced similar violence, in a demonstration in Bilbao against ETA. Similar violence happened in the days just after the March 11 Islamist attacks. In all these cases there were intransigent opportunists who deflected the protest away from the real criminals in the direction of sectarian feuding between parties, using entirely unacceptable, undemocratic means.

We can only condemn what happened on Saturday. But we need to examine the misunderstandings which may have served as an excuse for it. Some extremist elements may have been involved, addicted to aggression. But they were, I think, a minority, and we must ask how they were able to gather the critical mass evident that day. How have we arrived at a situation in which many victims of terrorism, and those who are worried about it, and about the separatist movements that really or supposedly threaten our democratic system, can come to see, in the government and in the Socialist party, an insensitivity to the question or an inclination to exploit and manipulate it? The obvious sympathies of many for the conservative Popular Party (PP) does not suffice to explain the exasperated hostility with which many of these people seem to regard the representatives of the center-left in the present government, in the media, or in the cinema industry.

Consider, for example, the case of someone in San Sebastián last week, someone who has personally suffered the effects of terrorist intimidation and who seeks protection under the umbrella of the democratic, constitutional political parties. On the eve of the day of the city's patron saint, he sees how a public award is given to the famous cook Berasategui, recently accused of giving funds to ETA. The lehendakari, present in person, commiserates about how ill at ease he must have felt on being questioned by the judge. Our spectator just sighs in resignation, and that night, stays home and watches the celebrations on TV, not caring to share the town's Constitution Square with people brandishing placards in favor of ETA, or of the multiple killer De Juana Chaos, who, it seems, is suffering acutely because they will not let him out of jail to kill again. Our friend knows it is useless to protest, and better just to look the other way.

On Saturday morning he attends a meeting in the Kursaal, in memory of Gregorio Ordoñez, murdered by ETA 10 years ago. The hard core of pro-Spanish constitutional people in the city are here. Most of the speakers are of the PP, a party to which Ordoñez also belonged, though friendly mention of the PSOE, it being a constitutional ally, is made in all the speeches. But few local leaders of the PSOE are there. The major figures, Odón Elorza, Paulino Luesma, Patxi López, Egiguren, all are absent. Many among the public in the hall are Socialist voters - but the people they vote for are somewhere else. With a certain feeling of abandonment, our Basque man goes away, to the cinema, to clear his head. In the one nearest his home there is a film featuring a young leftist actor who, in a recent visit to the Basque Country, remarked how intolerable the behavior of the PP and the PSOE was in the anti-terrorist struggle, with the outlawing of Batasuna, the closure of the pro-independence newspaper Egunkaria, etc. Though the general tone of his remarks suggested an intelligence deserving of pity, our Basque has taken a dislike to him, and does not care to see the film. He prefers to go home and watch TV, where he sees the demonstration in Madrid and the aggression against Bono.

Then Llamazares appears on the screen, saying that the victims have been "manipulated" by the right during two legislatures. And our Basque zaps to another channel, because he cannot be asked to watch that.

http://www.elpais.es© 2005 El Pais

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After all those words, what exactly did he say?

Poor thing, I pity him.

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Arana Prize for Bieter

The Mayor of Boise, Dave Bieter, has been awarded the Arana Prize.

He is the second descendant of Basque immigrants to the USA who wins this award.

Him and the previous winner, Pete Cenarrusa, spearheaded a Memorial from the State of Idaho that supported the peaceful self-determination of the Basque Country.

Of course, Francoist minded idiots from Spain got a coronary over this, well, too bad for them.

By the way, Boise, home of the largest Basque community in the USA will be hosting the Jaialdi this year, it is the biggest event for the Basque American community and it takes place once every 5 years.

Zorionak Dave!

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