Madrid blast 'ends Eta ceasefire'

Madrid blast 'ends Eta ceasefire'

Basque separatist group Eta have carried out a car bomb attack at a Madrid airport ending a ceasefire, the Spanish government has announced.
At least four people were injured in the blast in the car park of terminal four at Barajas Airport.

"It is an attack which breaks nine months without violent actions by Eta," said Spain's interior minister.

He said the prime minister would stress later that "violence and dialogue are incompatible in democracy".

Officials said Eta had made a call to claim the attack - but the Spanish government has not called off peace talks with the separatists.

The Eta ceasefire was declared in March after four decades of violence aimed at creating an independent Basque state in the north of the country.

Pressure grows

The bomb exploded at about 0900 (0800 GMT), causing minor injuries to four people including two police officers and a taxi driver, emergency services said.

The authorities had time to evacuate the area, but one person is still missing. The bomb significantly damaged the car park, sending a huge plume of smoke over the terminal.


ETA TIMELINE
1959: Eta founded
1968: Eta kills San Sebastian secret police chief Meliton Manzanas, its first victim
1973: PM Luis Carrero Blanco assassinated
1978: Political wing Herri Batasuna formed
1980: 118 people killed in bloodiest year
Sept 1998: Indefinite ceasefire
Nov 1999: End of ceasefire, followed by more bomb attacks in January and February 2000
Dec 2001: EU declares Eta a terrorist organisation
March 2003: Batasuna banned by Supreme Court
May 2003: Two police killed in Eta's last deadly attack
Nov 2005: 56 alleged Eta activists on trial in the largest prosecution of its kind
March 2006: Eta declares permanent ceasefire


Flights in and out of terminal four have been halted, and there is chaos at the other three terminals, officials say.

"It is an attack, I repeat, which breaks the permanent cease-fire which Eta ordered nearly nine months ago," Interior Minister Alfredo Perez Rubalcaba told a news conference.

He said Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero would "do something more extensive" when he addresses the country at about 1700 GMT on Saturday.

"It is a brief political assessment," Mr Rubalcaba said, "in line with something which you have often heard me say, which it is appropriate to repeat today more categorically than ever.

"It is that violence is incompatible with dialogue in any democracy... And that is a rule which the government will firmly maintain."

In March, Eta declared that it was permanently ending an armed campaign that has killed more than 800 people.

In response, Mr Zapatero announced the beginning of talks with the militant separatist group, although discussions have not officially started.

Victims' associations and the conservative opposition are renewing their demands that the government immediately call off the peace process, says the BBC's Danny Wood in Madrid.


Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/europe/6219431.stm

Published: 2006/12/30 13:38:53 GMT