Spanish court keeps Batasuna leaders in jail
MADRID (AFP) — A Spanish court ruled Sunday that most of the leadership of the banned Basque separatist party Batasuna arrested last week over alleged links to ETA should be held in jail, a court spokesman announced.
Judge Baltasar Garzon followed the recommendation of prosecutors, who had asked that most of the 19 Batasuna leaders arrested be detained while the investigation into terrorism-related charges continued.
Among those detained was Joseba Permach, one of Batasuna's main spokesmen, and Juan Jose Petrokorena, who handles the movement's communications strategy.
Garzon had already ruled two days earlier that Joseba Alvarez, one of the main leaders of the movement, be detained.
Twenty-three people were arrested Thursday in the town of Segura, in the Spanish Basque Country, during a Batasuna meeting that violated an order suspending the party.
They were arrested on suspicion of belonging to "a terrorist organisation".
Spanish newspapers reported Sunday that police arrested the group after learning it was in the process of aligning itself to the violent policies of armed Basque group ETA, which in June ended a 15-month ceasefire.
A Spanish legal source, declining to be named, said Garzon decided to hit Batasuna's leaders "to avoid the reorganisation" of the party.
Among those held Sunday was Rufino Etxebarria, described as the political commissar of ETA and also leader of Batasuna's predecessor party, Herri Batasuna.
Mikel Zubimendi, a former leader of Batasuna's youth wing and a one time deputy of Herri Batasuna, was also held.
The judge followed the prosecutors' recommendations by releasing Jean-Claude Aguerre et Haizpea Abrisqueta, two leaders of Batasuna in France, where the party is not banned, on 10,000 euros' (14,000 dollars') bail.
In all, 17 of the 23 people arrested have been detained and four released on bail.
Earlier Sunday, Garzon released without charge two other people who helped Batasuna rent a room for the meeting but did not belong to the party leadership.
One of Spain's biggest newspapers, El Pais, said "Batasuna was going to bring back an internal structure to better embrace the violent strategy of ETA after the latter's breaking of its ceasefire on June 5."
The left-wing daily, which is close to Spain's Socialist government, said that assertion was based on documents seized by police following the arrests.
The arrests triggered unrest in Spain's northern Basque region in the form of street protests and firebomb attacks on a post office, a courthouse, a municipal building and a bus.
A Batasuna leader who was not arrested, Pernando Barrena, on Saturday called the arrests "a declaration of war".
Overnight Saturday, further violence erupted. In Bilbao, youths set fire to several rubbish bins and threw petrol bombs against cash machines. In Navarra, banks and a trade union office were also targeted by Molotov cocktails.
Spain's government has taken a tougher stance against ETA since the militant group ended its ceasefire after 15 months, with Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero rejecting any negotiations.
The group -- listed as a terrorist organisation by the European Union and the United States -- is blamed for the deaths of 819 people during almost four decades of fighting for its cause.
Batasuna, which has Marxist-Leninist leanings, has been banned as a party since 2003 for refusing to condemn violence and cut its links to ETA.
The detained leaders face charges related to Garzon's investigation into those links, especially the party's suspected financing of ETA's activities.
