This file is a mirror of EUSKAL HERRIA JOURNAL by Basque Red Net.

July 29--

Spain's Former Civil Governor Killed in Basque Town.

Spain's former civil governor in the Basque province of Gipuzkoa was shot and killed on Saturday in the latest attack blamed on ETA, officials said. Juan Maria Jauregui, who according to police moved out the region in 1996 after ETA planned to attack him on April 1996, was shot twice in the head as he sat in a cafe while vacationing in the town of Tolosa. Two men wearing dark glasses, suspected members of the Basque liberation organization Euskadi Ta Askatasuna, walked into the cafe and one of them shot Jauregi in the head. They later blew up their getaway car in a neighbouring village in an apparent attempt to cover their tracks, police said. It was the seventh killing blamed on ETA since it called off a 14-month-long ceasefire last December. Jauregui, 49, had been based in Chile for the past three years as head of South American operations for Aldeasa, a Spanish company that operates a chain of airport duty-free shops. His colleagues had requested police protection for him when they learned he was planning a two-week holiday in Tolosa, where he had once served on the town council. But Spanish media reported that no bodyguard was assigned. The Spanish government says ETA used the cease-fire to reorganize, resupply and recruit and has now launched a full-fledged offensive in its battle for Basque national liberation. "Today ETA has new logistics, a new infrastructure which the security forces must be able to detect," Interior Minister Jaime Mayor Oreja said earlier this month in Malaga. Jauregui was appointed civil governor of Guipuzcoa province -- a separatist stronghold -- under the Socialist government headed by Felipe Gonzalez, who was ousted by Jose Maria Aznar and his Popular Party in a general election in 1996. During his two-year tenure, Jauregui was said to have backed the investigation of death squads secretly directed by Socialist officials that targeted ETA activists in 1980s. He was married and had a 19-year-old daughter.