SPAIN: Julen Madariaga, one of the founding members of the Basque separatist movement Eta, was arrested in France yesterday, accused of running an extortion operation to raise funds for the terrorist organisation.
Madariaga (74) and another Eta veteran, Angel Iturbe Abásola (53), were among the 12 arrested - seven in France and five in Spain - in a joint police operation which has been under way for the past two years.
The 12 are alleged to have operated a network for the past 20 years raising funds through blackmail and collecting "revolutionary taxes". Although Eta declared a "permanent" ceasefire almost three months ago, and it is more than three years since they killed anyone, their money-raising activities have continued.
A dozen threatening letters were received by Basque businessmen a month after the ceasefire, and last weekend two alleged Eta militants were followed by police and detained in France after collecting €60,000 from a bar in Spain.
Mr Madariaga left Eta some years ago and joined Arelar, a political group which renounces violence but supports the struggle for an independent Basque nation through peaceful methods.
He and the other six detained in France are aged between 48 and 74 and were all living openly and legally in the Bayonne/Biarritz area.
The arrests have come just 24 hours before the Spanish prime minister, José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, is expected to announce to parliament the start of contacts between representatives of his government and those of the banned Batasuna, Eta's political front.
Alfredo Perez Rublacaba, the interior minister, was quick to stress that the situation had not changed. "The latest arrests should not impede the peace process," he insisted.