Batasuna blames failure of process on Government and truce brakdown on ETA

The spokesman for outlawed leftwing nationalist Batasuna, Arnaldo Otegi, said that the responsibility for the breakdown of the ceasefire was "unique and exclusively ETA's" although he affirmed that "the failure and collapse of the so-called peace process" should be blamed on the Spanish Government and Basque Nationalist Party PNV.

Otegi spoke at a press conference in Donostia-San Sebastian alongside also party members Marije Fullaondo and Pernando Barrena, and assured that despite "the great worry" the breakdown of the truce may cause, politicians should not make citizens believe "everything is over" because "the process is still possible in this country."

Otegi noted that leftwing nationalism completely stands by its commitments to solve the conflict through dialogue, and added that truces and goodwill attempts are "part of the process, but are not the process."

Resume of the Basque pro-independence left's press conference on the end of ETA's cease-fire

0.- Today is a bad day.
1- We want to share with society the huge preoccupation for the collapse of the process.

2- About ETA's statement:

2.1. This announcement's responsibility corresponds exclusively to ETA.

2.2. The responsibility of the collapse and the lack of steps on the process clearly lay on the Spanish government and the PNV.

2.3. We have learned that peace and cease-fires can not be given for granted and that cease-fires and the end of all kind of violence are part of the process, are part of it but are not the process itself.

3-Why have we reached this situation of collapse? Three circumstances to be underlined:

3.1. Spanish government's lack of courage;

- It has not given steps towards the good direction of the process.

- Furthermore, it has boasted itself of doing less than the PP.

3.2. Lack of political dialogue in equality conditions

- If somebody had suggested, at the beginning of the process, that now a days we would continue being illegal, it would have seemed absurd: that is never the less the reality, the undemocratic situation lived these past elections it has been the last straw.


3.3. Lack of clear commitment towards a change of framework agenda in the Basque Country

- The rejection to resolve both keys of the conflict; Right to decide our future and end of partition.

- These are the reasons for the collapse and the lack of steps on the process


4.- What now? The opportunity for a process still exists: the Basque pro-independence left does not consider the process buried nor ended.

4.1. Dialogue, negotiation and agreement are now more necessary than ever.

- That is why the Spanish government, must leave aside the anti-terrorist schemes to confront the political problem and search for a solution.

4.2. The proposal for a democratic framework will continue being our offer for the resolution.

- The Basque pro-independence left has forwarded the only existing resolution proposal with which we will, from now on also, address our people.


- The Basque pro-independence left forwarded both "Now The People Now the Peace " proposal and "Autonomy for 4 provinces" proposals to firstly make the way to the process and secondly fill it with political content. So we ask: where are the other parties' proposals?

4.3. The Basque pro-independence left wants to assure the Basque Country that from now on, will work with more intensity and initiative than ever, to re-enter in a definitive resolution scenario .

- We will continue working, as up until now, with responsibility and request to all the political parties involved to do the same.

- We will get in touch with the Basque political agents as well as those in the international scope.

- Last thought: We cannot loose this opportunity! The only alternative to the process is process itself!!.