Thursday, October 8, 1998

1. Spain Wants Settlement With ETA Designed By Anti-Terrorism Pact. Promise reform of prisoner policy. Postpone political debate.

(October 5, 1998) - Last Friday Spain's Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar announced the government would open a peace process if ETA makes its truce a permanent one. Aznar read the announcement outside the presidential palace in Madrid where he had just finished a first round of talks with leading politicians to forge a united front in response to the ETA truce.

The self-defined `Revolutionary and socialist organization' Euskadi Ta Askatasuna (ETA, Basque Homeland and Freedom) last month announced a total, indefinite ceaserfire which began on September 18.

The ETA communique states that the armed organization is waiting for reactions to decide whether to make the truce a permanent one, which would entail a laying down of arms.

But Spanish media analysts report the truce is "irreversible" and that the face-saving nationalist agreement that preceded it attest to that.

The ETA truce followed the Lizarra Declaration, a Basque nationalist agreement issued on September 12.

The carefully-worded document known as the Lizarra Declaration calls for an open and unconditioned dialogue between all parties in the conflict. It was sponsored by the left-wing Basque political party Herri Batasuna (HB) and backed by the conservative Basque Nationalist Party (PNV), the leading political group in the regional parliament of Bascongadas -- the region composed of three of the four Basque provinces in Spain.

The Spanish government rejected the Lizarra Declaration calling it "a mockery."

Prime Minister Aznar stated in his declaration on Friday that the peace process would be separated from a political debate or process on Basque demands, and established as designed by the 1986 anti-terrorism Pact of Ajuria Enea agreed by national and regional political parties in Bascongadas.

A first stage of the peace process would include the relaxation of the prisoners policy, including moving the Basque political prisoners (ETA) prisoners to jails near the Basque provinces, social reinsertion, parole, and finally, amnesty; and economic aid to "the victims of terrorism." The political debate would be postponed for later on as suggested by the Basque Nationalist Party.

Aznar's proposal for peace talks does not demand that ETA decomission arms but ask the armed organization to make its truce a permanent one.

The proposal incorporates what Aznar may have agreed in his first round of talks with leading politicians: Articles 9, 10 and 12 of the anti-terrorism Pact of Ajuria Enea which refer to "a negotiated end to the violence":

Article 9:

" As a result of the resolutions adopted unanimously by the Basque Parliament, we consider valid and therefore give our support to the means of assimilating into society those persons that decide or have decided to abandon the use of violence and to defend their ideas through democratic channels, respecting in each case the decisions adopted by the state institutions with competencies in this regard."

" If suitable conditions arise for a negotiated end to the violence, grounded in a clear willingness to put an end to such violence and in unequivocal attitudes that give a clear indication of such willingness, we give our support to a process of dialogue between the competent state authorities and those who decide to abandon violence, respecting at all times the irrevocable democratic principle that political issues should be resolved solely through the legitimate representatives of the people's will."

"We reiterate our support of the text agreed by the Human Rights' Commission of the Basque Parliament at the meeting held on May 13, 1987 concerning aid to victims of terrorist attacks and their families."

Basque political prisoners on trial in Madrid said last week that they object to being used as hostages by the Spanish government, and demanded to be allowed to participate in the political negotiations.

But a political debate or negotiations on the future of the four Basque provinces in Spain (Araba, Bizkaia and Gipuzkoa a.k.a. Bascongadas and Navarre) would be excluded from the peace process.

Last week Aznar met with the president of the Basque Nationalist Party, Xabier Arzalluz in a closed-door session at the presidential palace in Madrid. Arzalluz "guaranteed" Aznar that a political debate on Basque demands (i.e. self-determination, a reform of the Spanish constitution, and the unity of Bascongadas and Navarre), would be excluded from the peace process, the Spanish press reported.

Another PNV leader, Jose Antonio Ardanza, told a news conference in Brussels last month that in order to separate the ETA truce and a solution to the ETA prisoners, from a political process, negotiations should be postponed till year 2000.

Ardanza, the main architect of the anti-terrorism Pact of Ajuria Enea, issued a peace proposal for multiparty talks. The Ardanza proposal issued in March holds that the conflict is among Basques and not between Euskal Herria and Madrid/Paris, and excludes ETA from political negotiations.

After his meeting with Aznar in Madrid, Arzalluz told a newsconference that his party backs the Ardanza proposal. He also promoted the creation of "a new Basque committee" (to replace the anti-terrorism Pact of Ajuria Enea committee?) that would include Herri Batasuna.

Fearing it would be left out from a possible settlement, the PNV has long opposed political negotiations between the government and ETA. The PNV boycotted the government-ETA talks in Algeria in 1989.

Spanish media analysts hold that although the Lizarra Declaration, backed by the PNV, calls for multilateral talks between all parties in the conflict, the text was explicity chosen and necessary to have the document backed by the ETA militancy. That is, the signatories of the Lizarra Declaration know that the only possible negotiations between ETA and the government would entail seeking a solution to the situation of the Basque political prisoners.

The immediate priorities of the signatories of the Lizarra Declaration, said the Spanish daily El Pais on Monday, include looking for national as well as international support to the process proposed by the Declaration, and to prepare the text for a debate of the two key aspects of the document: the recognition of the territoriality of Euskal Herria, and the right to self-determination.

Basque and Spanish politicians are currently exploring Article 1 of the Spanish constitution's Additional Provisions which they say satifies nationalist demands.

"The constitution is open to the political process. It would have to be re-interpreted according to the current political situation," said Miguel Herrero Miqon, one of the "founding fathers" of the Spanish constitution of 1978. For Herrero Miqon, self-determination, which "is not the same as independence," is found in the constitution and there is no need for a constitutional reform to recognize this right.

Article 1 of the Additional Provisions "protects and respects the historic rights of the territories with "fueros" [special laws] -- Bascongadas and Navarre, the Euskal Herria in Spain.

According to Article 1, "the general updating of the "fuero" system shall be carried out, when appropriate, within the framework of the Constitution and of the Statutes of Autonomy."

The Road to the Anti-Terrorism Pact of Ajuria Enea:

In February 1983, Madrid launched the Zona Especial Norte, (ZEN, Special North Zone), a political and military plan against ETA activists and supporters coordinated by the police and political institutions.

The `Anti-Terrorist Groups of Liberation' (GAL, Grupos Anti-terroristas de Liberacisn) run and financed by Spain's Ministry of Interior began its campaign of bombing, kidnapping and murder of Basque refugees in the north of Euskal Herria in France. GAL killed at least 28 people and injured hundreds -- including women and children.

France has denied any role in Spain's dirty war but allegations have been made that French police helped GAL death squads wage war on Basque refugees.

The Spanish dirty war resulted in a greater cooperation between France and Spain to end the "Basque problem" by police action. But Spain's lack of legitimacy in southern Basque provinces in Spain (the Spanish constitution of 1978 was approved by only one-third of the electorate in Euskal Herria south) required the cooperation of the Basque sector in control of the regional government.

A Madrid conference on violence, politics and terrorism sponsored by the Spanish media group Grupo 16 took place in Madrid in 1984. Leading Basque and Spanish politicians, journalists and media people participated in the conference.

The conference issued the Madrid Declaration on Terrorism, ratified in 1986 by representatives of national and regional political parties -- including the Basque Nationalist Party.

In 1985, while the GAL death squads were in full campaign, ETA killed a Spanish army colonel and chief of the regional police of Bascongadas, Carlos Diaz Arcocha. The PNV saw the killing as a personal attack.

After the execution of Diaz Arcocha, the PNV proposed a political strategy against ETA, including rallies, media propaganda, a plan to promote "citizenship consciousness"; and a commission of international experts to study violence in Euskal Herria and how to stop it. The PNV project proposal was approved by the Bascongadas parliament.

A report of the Commission of Experts was issued on April 1986. Members of the commission included Clive Rose (Britain's ambassador to NATO), Peter Janke (head of British Institute for the study of conflicts), and Hans Joseph Horchem (German right-wing party Conservative Action). The experts report concluded that the political nature of Basque terrorism required the cooperation of Basques to fight it and reccomended the following:

• More power to the regional police of Bascongadas to fight terrorism and greater cooperation between the information services of the central and regional governments [of the four Basque provinces in Spain];
• A "special legislation for Basque prisoners convicted of terrorism;" the social re-integration of the political prisoners "to obtain the cooperation of the terrorists and re-integrate them into the main current of political life";
• An anti-terrorism plan that would get the support of the population and hide its military aspects;
• The teaching of Basque culture, necessary to fight violence according to the Commission, must be taught within the European context;
• More implication of the regional institutions in the conflict.

Negotiation was not excluded from the experts report but it was not specified as a means to achieve a political solution to the conflict.

The Anti-terrorism Pacts:

The Madrid Pact against terrorism was agreed on November 1987 by national and regional political parties, including the Basque Nationalist Party.

The fifth article of the Madrid Pact states the importance of an agreement among the Basque political parties "for the achievement of peace in Euskadi and the rest of the state. Therefore, we value the initiative of the lehendakari [the president of Bascongadas and PNV leader, Jose Antonio Ardanza] of the Basque government."

The PNV plan against ETA was presented by Ardanza and approved by the Bascongadas regional parliament in 1985.

The anti-terrorism Pact for the Normalization and Pacification of Euskadi (aka Pact of Ajuria Enea) was agreed by the political parties of Bascongadas---with the exception of Herri Batasuna---in January 1988, two months after the Anti-terrorist Pact of Madrid was established.

In Navarre, one of the four Basque provinces in Spain, the Navarrese Anti-terrorism Pact was agreed by the political parties--with the exception of Herri Batasuna--in October 1988.

The Pact of Ajuria Enea, and the Navarrese Anti-Terrorism Pact, adopted the recommendations made by the Commission of Experts supporting Spain's policy in Basque provinces and the repression and delegitimation of the Basque dissidence.