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Spain Arrests 9 Suspected ETA Separatists

   VOA News 14 September 2010
   An alleged member, center, of the armed Basque separatist group ETA is
   escorted  by  Spanish Civil Guard in the Basque city of San Sebastian,
   northern Spain, Tuesday Sept. 14, 2010.

Photo: AP

   An alleged member, center, of the armed Basque separatist group ETA is
   escorted  by  Spanish Civil Guard in the Basque city of San Sebastian,
   northern Spain, Tuesday Sept. 14, 2010.

   Spanish  security forces have arrested nine people with suspected ties
   to  ETA  in  the  biggest  sweep  since  the  Basque  separatist group
   announced a cease-fire earlier in the month.
   Spain's  Interior Ministry said in a statement Tuesday that police had
   led  a  number of pre-dawn raids in the Basque country and the regions
   of Navarra, Cantabria and Valencia.
   Television  pictures showed two of the arrests. The nine detainees are
   believed  to  be linked to Ekin, a Basque civic organization linked to
   ETA. Spain's National Court in 2007 ruled that Ekin was illegal.
   Tuesday's arrests came after the Spanish government earlier this month
   rejected  a  cease-fire proposal by ETA, saying the offer could not be
   trusted.
   On September 5, ETA militants issued a taped statement announcing they
   were  ending  "offensive  armed  action."  The  group had made similar
   statements in the past.
   Previous cease-fires have ended in violence.
   ETA  has  killed  at  least  800  people  in  its 40-year fight for an
   independent state in northern Spain and southwestern France.
   The  European  Union  and  the  United States consider ETA a terrorist
   organization. Most of its members have been arrested since 2008.

   Some information for this report was provided by AP, AFP and Reuters.

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