SPAIN: ETA Chief Arrested in France

By Tito Drago Reprint | | Print |

Tito Drago

MADRID, Sep 16 2000 (IPS) - French and Spanish militarised police officers arrested Iñaki de Rentería, considered the head of the illegal Basque separatist organisation ETA, in France Friday, the Spanish foreign ministry reported.

Ignacio Gracia Arregui, alias Iñaki de Rentería, was captured in the French town of Bidart, near the Spanish border, in a joint sting operation by the Spanish Guardia Civil and the French Gendarmerie.

The arrest coincided with the Spanish government’s decision to ask parliament to stiffen the sanctions for those convicted of carrying out bombing attacks or other violent acts, as well as for those who order, plan or publicly applaud such actions (“apologia of terrorism”).

The arrest followed the capture of 20 alleged members of the political leadership of ETA Wednesday in several Spanish localities, on the orders of Judge Baltasar Garzón, of Pinochet fame. (Former Chilean dictator General Augusto Pinochet was arrested in London in 1998 on the basis of a warrant issued by Garzón).

ETA (Euskadi ta Askartasuna, or Basque Fatherland and Liberty in the Basque language) emerged four decades ago to fight the dictatorship of General Francisco Franco (1939-75).

But it continued to stage violent actions after democracy was restored, even though the Autonomous Basque Community in northern Spain had its own parliament, police force and other institutions.

Iñaki de Rentería, now 45, was 20 when he joined the Politico- Military ETA organisation, one of the two branches into which the group was divided in the 1960s. When the courts issued an arrest warrant for him in the mid-1960s, he went underground.

The government of Adolfo Suárez (1976-81) issued a broad amnesty in 1977. As a consequence of the amnesty, the Politico- Military ETA broke up and became a political party, which years later joined the Spanish Socialist Workers Party (PSOE).

But Iñaki joined the ETA Military grouping, the other branch of the organisation, which in time came to be known merely as ETA.

The amnesty led France to stop recognising Iñaki as a victim of political persecution, and he was forced to begin living in clandestinity in that country as well.

He rose to the top leadership position of ETA in 1992, when the French and Spanish police caught the entire leadership of the organisation in Bidart, and seized their archives, explosives and arms.

Iñaki is facing charges in Garzón’s court, accused of ordering a 1995 attempt on King Juan Carlos’ life, which was aborted by the police and by the arrest of three ETA members who at one point even had the King in the telescopic sights of a high-powered rifle.

The three testified that the assassination had been ordered by Iñaki. They said they did not shoot when they had the King in their sights because their retreat was not yet secure.

Friday’s arrest came before the start of the interrogations of the alleged ETA members captured Wednesday, and 24 hours after ETA shot José Ramón Recalde, a former justice minister of the Basque autonomous government and member of the PSOE.

Recalde was shot in the face, but was not killed.

The attack was the 24th committed by ETA since late 1999, when it broke off the unilateral truce it had declared a year and a half earlier. While the truce lasted, the group held fruitless high-level talks with representatives of the government.

Sources with the legal system told IPS that France could give the go-ahead to Iñaki’s extradition based on a summary being drawn up by Judge Garzón.

The Spanish interior ministry said the police operation that began in Bidart was not yet finished, and that they hoped to capture more members of ETA over the next few days.