BASQUE COUNTRY: ETA AND BILDU. PLEASE, CALL A SPADE A SPADE
lunes, 11 de julio de 2011
BASQUE COUNTRY: ETA AND BILDU. PLEASE, CALL A SPADE A SPADE
HIPERCOR
Photo: www.vianetworks.es/personal/angelberto
I am pretty fed up with some foreign media that cover ETA[1]activities with a pink political mantle and consider the current Basque Country situation as a “happy hour” for peace. They tag ETA as a “separatist organization” or a “Basque separatist group”. What a beautiful euphemism! They never use “terrorist organization” as Spanish and French authorities, the European Union[2] or the United States of America[3] have officially categorized it. For me, they are only a “gang of coward killers”. These gudaris[4], experts in placing car-bombs and shooting in the back of the head, wet their pants when my admired Civil Guard arrests them[5].
Since 1960, when ETA killed a nearly two-year old girl, Begoña Urroz Ibarrola, this bunch of sons of bitches has killed more than 850 people. There is nothing “romantic” in this figure. Apart from policemen, soldiers, journalists, judges and politicians, their favorite victims, children, women or old people were murdered, all of them very dangerous “military” targets. There is nothing “heroic” about eliminating these innocent people. Hipercor supermarket in Barcelona, Corona de Aragón Hotel in Zaragoza, buildings for the Civil Guard families in Vic, Zaragoza, Burgos[6]… they really were “High Value Targets” for them. And please, do not use this demagogic argument: “But, they were democratic fighters against the Franco dictatorship”. More than 90% of their crimes were committed after 1975, when Franco was already dead.
PHOTO: www.bbc.co.uk/news
CASA-CUARTEL IN VIC
Photo: www.vianetworks.es/personal/angelberto
Sincerely, I do not understand that indulgence. You, English, what would you think if I called IRA[7] “group of fighters for the Freedom of Ireland”? Or you, Italian, what would you think if I named the Brigate Rosseas “protectors of the working class”? Or you, German, what would you think if I called the Baader-Meinhof band “antifascist student group”? Or finally, all of you, what would you think if I wrote that Al-Qaeda is an “Islamic movement of resistance against the Western oppression”? Don’t piss me off.
Now, after the last local elections, an extreme left-wing coalition named BILDU-EUSKOALKARTASUNA-ALTERNATIBA[8]achieved power in several town halls. Even the city of San Sebastián and its province Guipúzcoa are now under its direction. I am not allowed, because it is a political matter, to say what BILDU is or is not, but I can provide a rough translation of two main points included in the Sentence of the Spanish Supreme Court dated on 1st of May 2011[9], as “proved conclusions”:
Errandonea, ETA criminal just released, with a banner in favor of BILDU
Photo: EFE
BILDU coalition is the outcome of an arrangement among BATASUNA, EUSKO ALKARTASUNA and ALTERNATIBA that allows ETA to return to the territorial administrations.
BILDU participation in the local elections is a risk for democracy. In case of being elected, they will have access to public information and the possibility to take decisions, which are fraught with pressures to people or even the society, and establish a program of government which could benefit ETA objectives.
A military group in the Gorbea Mountain. The nationalists considered the
Spanish flag placed in the monument as an insult. Photo: www.elmundo.es
It is also true that BILDU appealed to the Constitutional Court and the result was a Sentence dated on 5th of May 2011[10] where the main argument was the following:
Evidences included in the Sentence of the Supreme Court does not have force enough to deprive BILDU of its constitutional right of political participation. Besides, in case of a real link with ETA/BATASUNA, there are control tools a posteriori.
I do not want to get bogged down in legal terms, but we are already seeing the consequences of the BILDU presence in territorial administrations in the Basque provinces.
I was assigned in the Basque Country for one year. I know what it means not to be a nationalist there. I know the pressure of the radicals over the rest. I saw the fear of being marked as “español”. I saw the arrogance among the nationalists. I know how the victims of ETA feel now underneath, because I have friends belonging this collective.
Even living out of the Basque Country, I know what it means to check your car every morning looking for a bomb. My wife knows what it means to wait for hearing the street door closing when I went out to work. Listening to the slam…and nothing more.
Paratrooper in the beach of Getxo
Photo: www.olddocedoce.net
Photo: www.lacomunidad.elpais.es
Because I know all of that, I do not understand some foreign media behavior. Because I know all of that, I have written this article in my limited English. Because when this summer you visit the Basque Country and you enjoy its wonderful food, its marvelous ladscapes, its fun popular festivals, its beaches...please, try to chat about politics in a taberna, count how many Spanish flags you are able to see, on the other hand, count how many posters with the motto "Euskal presoak, Euskal herrira" or how many ETA signs drawn on the cities' walls you can see. Then, I hope you remember my words.
Photo: www.sunyol.net
After that, of course, you can keep your opinion and think: “Good guys, these abertzales[11]”.
[1] ETA stands for Eskadi Ta Askatasuna, Basque homeland and Freedom, in English.
[2] EU List of Terrorist Organizations. 29th May 2006.
[3] Foreign Terrorist Organizations (FTOs). 09th July 2008.
[4] Gudari is the name given to the soldiers belonging to the Basque Government Army during the Civil War (1936-1939). Nowadays, this is what the radical left-wing parties in the Basque Country call the ETA members.
[5] For instance, Aitzol Irondo, considered ETA military chief at that time, was arrested in France in December 2008. The police who frisked him could check he had wet his pair of trousers (www.publico.es). Oscar Barreras Díaz, who was arrested in April 1997 in San Sebastián, got the shits and was fully wet when arrested (www.elpais.com). Harriet Iragi Gurruchaga (despite his name, he is a man) arrested in Sevilla in October 2000 after killing Colonel (med) Muñoz Cariñanos, was completely shitty and wet.
[6] One characteristic of the Civil Guard is to work very closely with the population they protect. This implies living and working in the towns and villages where they are deployed. Families of the guards live in buildings attached to the barracks, even inside them. It is a tradition in the Civil Guard called “casa-cuartel”. This configuration guarantees 24/7 availability but it raises its vulnerability as well. ETA has attacked this kind of buildings 89 times, killing 33 people and wounding more than 290, the most of them guards' relatives.
[7] IRA stands for Irish Republican Army.
[8] BILDU means “to meet” in Euskera. ETA needs funding and to create political parties is the best way to reach not only money but also power and sensitive information. Thus, ETA has tried to be present in the government institutions since democracy was established in Spain. Some franchises were Herri-Batasuna, Euskal Herritarrok, Batasuna, Herritarren Zerrenda, Eusko Abertzale Ekintza / Acción Nacionalista Vasca, Aukera Guztiak, Abertzale Sozialistak, SORTU, etc. In this case, ETA joined its “puppet party” to other two legal ones, Eusko-Alkartasuna and Alternatiba Eraikitzen, in order to hide its real intention.
[9] Through this 120-page Sentence, the Spanish Supreme Court overturned all the candidacies of BILDU avoiding, in principal, their participation in the local elections. You can read the whole document in www.aelpa.org/actualidad/mayo2011/sentencia-supremo-bildu.pdf (in Spanish, I did not find an English version).
[10] In this 54-page Sentence, issued only four days after the first one, the Constitutional Court admitted the participation of BILDU in the local elections. You can read the whole document in www.aelpa.org/actualidad/mayo2011/tcsentenciabildu.pdf (in Spanish too)
[11] The meaning of “Abertzale” in English is “patriot”. This word refers to Basque radical nationalism.
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