FRENCH police commandos, in a joint operation with Spanish police, seized one of the three leaders of the Basque separatist group ETA yesterday in a blow to the guerrillas who have been targeting tourists in Spain.
Mr Julian Achurra Egurola, known as "Pototo", a member of the movement's three man executive in charge of arms and logistics, was arrested in a farm at Lasseubc, near Pau in southwestern France, the French Interior Ministry said.
About 30 police found a cache of arms including an anti tank rocket, submachine guns, grenades and detonators in the farm house, along with electronic address books and a seal of the separatist group.
Meanwhile, in another attack, a man lost a foot when a bomb attached to his car exploded in the centre of the Basque city of San Sebastian.
Mr Albino Machado Pires (35) had one foot amputated and was undergoing surgery for severe injuries on the other. His condition was described as serious.
The bomb exploded at 8.20 a.m. Irish time when Mr Pires started his car. He had been working as a cook, and had not previously come to their notice, police said.
ETA (Basque Homeland and Freedom) has killed 800 people in its 28 year old fight for Basque independence. An ETA bomb at the weekend injured 35 tourists including a Dublin woman and her 10 year old son at Reus airport. ETA placed five more bombs in seaside hotels.
Spain's conservative Popular Party (PP) government, in power since May, refuses to negotiate with ETA unless it lays down its arms and frees a kidnapped prison officer.
"ETA remains committed to being the judge and executioner of Basque society," Mr Carlos Iturgaiz, PP secretary general for the Basque region, said after yesterday's attack.
Police said a young French woman held along with Mr Egurola was "small fry" and not a suspected senior ETA activist, contrary to Spanish media reports. The two were flown to Paris for questioning.
A neighbour said the house owned by a French bank employee, had been rented out for about three months and that a third person had left on Monday night.
Spanish authorities said there were nine arrest warrants out for Pototo involving the murder of policemen, bombings and grenade attacks.
In recent years concerted action by Spanish and French police has brought a string of arrests of leading militants in the Spanish Basque country and especially in southwest France.
The Spanish Interior Ministry said Pototo was recruited into ETA's "Vizcaya" cell in 1984, providing the group with information about three people who were later killed.
He is alleged to have killed a police officer in Bilbao in October, 1986. In 1994, a Paris tribunal sentenced him in his absence to eight years imprisonment.