Off the wire
• No basis for continuous yuan falls: Central bank  • No rest as Spanish La Liga moves into 27th round of games  • Morocco, Belgium vow to boost bilateral security cooperation  • 70 militants killed, Afghan forces overrun Taliban bastion in northern province  • Deadly swine-flu claims 34 lives in India's Rajasthan  • Chinese national among 18 killed in Oman traffic accident: embassy  • Spanish stock market ends month with gains  • (Sports)Chinese women's team wins 4th round at World Table Tennis Championships  • Bangladeshi police seize 70,000 yaba tablets, arrest 10 suspects  • Gunmen abduct three schoolgirls in Nigeria's Lagos State  
You are here: 　 Home

Basque leader Arnaldo Ortegi released from prison

Xinhua, March 1, 2016 Adjust font size:

Arnaldo Ortegi, a leader of the political wing of Basque separatist group, ETA, was released from prison on Tuesday after serving a six and a half year sentence.

The 57-year-old had been sent to jail after being found guilty of trying to rebuild the Basque separatist party Batasuna, which had been illegal in Spain since 2003 and considered to be the political wing of ETA, whose armed campaign for the independence of the Basque Region led to over 820 deaths, before a ceasefire in November 2011.

Although Ortegi had been a member of the radical independence movement since the age of 19, he is also seen by many as a key member of the peace process, being one of the first to call for ETA's disarmament in the 1990s.

He also played a major role in the negotiations between ETA and the Spanish government between 2006-2007, which broke down after ETA members opposed to talks planted a car bomb in the car part of Terminal 4 at Madrid's Barajas airport, claiming two lives.

While in prison in 2012 Ortegi made a "most sincere apology," for the "pain and humiliation," suffered by ETA victims and their families and a year later, he was elected as the General Secretary of Sortu, a legal pro-Basque independence party, which opposes violence.

Many have questioned the wisdom of his imprisonment, with Baltazar Garzon, the judge who ordered his arrest in 2009 commenting Ortegi could "do much for peace outside of jail rather than inside."

That sentiment is not shared by everyone in a country where feelings about ETA run deep and in an editorial published on Monday the center-right newspaper "El Mundo" ran an editorial saying he was a "defender of extortion, kidnapping and assassination," but everyone agrees that with elections expected in the Basque region at the end of the year Arnaldo Ortegi will play a major role. Endit