The former Spanish Prime Minister, Mr Jose Maria Aznar, has defended his decision to blame the train bombings in Madrid last March on ETA and said he had never lied about the attacks.
Mr Aznar was testifying to a parliamentary commission investigating the bombings of four commuter trains that killed 191 people and injured 1,900.
Had ETA been responsible for the attack, it could have helped Aznar's then ruling party in an election held three days later, by seeming to justify his hard line against the group.
However, the conclusion of investigators that Islamic militants were to blame undermined Aznar's party because of its support for the US invasion of Iraq .
"My conscience is clear... we told the truth about what we knew," said Aznar, the first former prime minister to testify before a parliamentary investigation.
"The judgment of the police was that there was more than enough background and recent precedent to think that it was (ETA) that committed the attacks."
In the dramatic days between the bombings and the election Aznar and his ministers repeatedly asserted that ETA was responsible for the March 11 train bombings.
By election eve it became clear Islamist radicals were responsible, and disapproval of Aznar's handling of the events was widely believed to have swayed the vote to the Socialists.
Aznar, however, said his political opponents had yet to turn up the "smoking gun" to prove that his government lied.
Aznar chose not to seek a third term in the election and hand-picked the Popular Party candidate, Mariano Rajoy.
Instead, Socialist Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero came to power and immediately withdrew Spanish troops from Iraq , making good on a campaign promise.
The Madrid bombers made videotapes claiming the attacks in the name of al Qaeda in Europe and said they were seeking revenge for Spain sending troops to Iraq and Afghanistan.
Some 30 people are in custody or under court supervision for the train bombings, one minor has been convicted, seven prime suspects are dead, and two or three others remain at large.