General strike called as Basque leaders are jailed
By Norm Dixon
The left-wing Basque pro-independence party, Herri Batasuna (HB), has called a general strike across the four Spanish-ruled Basque provinces for December 15 in response to the jailing of its 23-member national executive. On December 1, Spain's Supreme Court found the HB leaders guilty of collaboration with the armed group ETA and sentenced each to seven years' jail and a fine of 500,000 pesetas (A$5000). The leaders will appeal.
The verdict is a blow to democratic rights. The 23 were charged for broadcasting a video and making press statements during Spain's last general election in support of ETA's call for negotiations for an independent Basque country. ETA's peace plan envisaged a cease-fire prior to an act of self-determination by Basques.
HB is a legal party that organises openly and peacefully and participates in parliamentary elections. It is the largest Basque political force in the province of Navarre and the second largest in Bascongadas, the province that groups the remaining Basque provinces under Spanish rule.
HB garners up to 20% of the vote in the Spanish-ruled Basque country. It has two parliamentarians in the national assembly and 11 in the Basque parliament.
Following the assassination by ETA in July of a politician from the ruling conservative Popular Party, the Spanish state set out to exploit outrage at the tactics of ETA to crush the nationalist movement.
Defence lawyers and HB leaders insist the trial was politically motivated and that the judges were under pressure from the Spanish government and big business media to convict, making a fair trial impossible.
High-level government politicians, most notably interior minister Jaime Mayor Oreja, campaigned publicly for a guilty verdict. "ETA equals HB, HB equals ETA", Oreja stated repeatedly.
Oreja snubbed an offer from the Basque Catholic Church — supported by the Spanish Catholic Church — to chair talks between Madrid and ETA.
International observers, representing human rights organisations from 11 countries, agreed that the trial was political and arbitrary. Public statements by political parties in other European countries would not result in prosecution, they said.
In a joint statement, issued on November 25, the observers said the trial broke "the fundamental principle of the presumption of innocence".
Prosecutors relied on political arguments against the right of self-determination for the Basque country and pointed to HB's refusal to condemn armed actions by ETA as proof that the two groups were one and the same.
Closing its case against the Basque leaders on October 31, chief prosecutor Jose Maria Luzon declared that the Basque country cannot ask for self-determination because "it is not a colony".
Luzon said HB "collaborated" with ETA by promoting a "deceptive" peace offer which demanded "conditions which were impossible to meet in exchange for nothing". The use of a pro-peace ETA video sought to "create a favourable atmosphere of understanding" for ETA, Luzon added.
Defence lawyer Jone Goirizelaia said that "nothing has been proved" and that the prosecution believed that simply presenting ETA and HB as the same was "sufficient to ask for a conviction".
Patxi Zabaleta, another lawyer for HB, said, "Ideas can never be a crime in a democracy, and the defendants should be acquitted".
Javier Madrozo, leader of the United Left in the Basque provinces, described the sentences as "extremely harsh" and predicted that a "climate of tension and social violence" would result. The sentences were "hardly compatible with the space for dialogue and detente that we need", he said.
An HB spokesperson, and one of the 23 defendants, Karmelo Landa, said the general strike would "stop the appalling, scandalous politics of the Popular Party" and "open paths to democracy".
Landa, who addressed a mass rally in Bilbao on November 9, said HB saw the negotiations between the British government and Sinn Féin as an example for ETA and the Spanish government.
On November 16, leaders of the Roman Catholic church in the Spanish-ruled Basque provinces called on Madrid to move the 540 Basque political prisoners to jails in the Basque country.
In June, Catholic clergy in the French-ruled Basque country called on the French government to move its 60 Basque political prisoners to the Basque country. The end to "dispersion" is a central demand of the Basque nationalist movement.