Bomb explodes near Spanish club after ETA call
MADRID (Reuters) - A bomb exploded outside a night-club in northern Spain on Wednesday after a warning from Basque separatist group ETA, but caused no injuries, Spanish officials and media reports said.
The bomb, left in a van parked behind the Bordatxo night-club in the small town of Santesteban, caused extensive damage, Europa Press news agency said.
"There has been an explosion in the area of the Bordatxo discotheque, apparently inside a vehicle," a government spokesman in the northern region of Navarre said.
He said the club was closed at the time and no one was hurt.
The blast followed a telephone warning by ETA to a Basque newspaper and the Basque highway authority, the typical method used by the group to warn of impending bombs.
ETA has planted a series of bombs at businesses in recent months in what is widely seen as an attempt to force companies to pay a "revolutionary tax" with which it funds itself.
ETA, branded a terrorist organisation by the European Union and the United States, has killed nearly 850 people since 1968 in a bombing and shooting campaign for an independent Basque state in northern Spain and south-western France.
It claims Navarre as part of a Basque homeland.
The last bomb exploded on Saturday at a seafood company in the Basque country, causing no injuries.
Spain is due to launch a special Christmas security plan on Thursday, mobilising 40,000 police officers over the holiday, when ETA often attacks.
The government blamed ETA for a bomb that exploded at a Civil Guard police barracks in northern Spain on December 22 last year, causing damage but no injuries. On Christmas Eve 2003, police foiled an attempt by ETA to blow up a train.
Hopes of a breakthrough in the long-running Basque conflict rose in May when Spain's parliament endorsed an unprecedented offer from the government to talk to ETA if it stopped violence.
ETA has sent mixed signals since then. It pledged in June to stop attacking elected politicians but a month later said it would still target members of the Spanish government.
This month, a Basque newspaper quoted ETA's internal bulletin as saying it would not call a cease-fire until the Spanish and French governments made concessions.
It has also stepped up the pace of small-scale bombings, but no one has been killed in an ETA attack since May 2003.
The bomb, left in a van parked behind the Bordatxo night-club in the small town of Santesteban, caused extensive damage, Europa Press news agency said.
"There has been an explosion in the area of the Bordatxo discotheque, apparently inside a vehicle," a government spokesman in the northern region of Navarre said.
He said the club was closed at the time and no one was hurt.
The blast followed a telephone warning by ETA to a Basque newspaper and the Basque highway authority, the typical method used by the group to warn of impending bombs.
ETA has planted a series of bombs at businesses in recent months in what is widely seen as an attempt to force companies to pay a "revolutionary tax" with which it funds itself.
ETA, branded a terrorist organisation by the European Union and the United States, has killed nearly 850 people since 1968 in a bombing and shooting campaign for an independent Basque state in northern Spain and south-western France.
It claims Navarre as part of a Basque homeland.
The last bomb exploded on Saturday at a seafood company in the Basque country, causing no injuries.
Spain is due to launch a special Christmas security plan on Thursday, mobilising 40,000 police officers over the holiday, when ETA often attacks.
The government blamed ETA for a bomb that exploded at a Civil Guard police barracks in northern Spain on December 22 last year, causing damage but no injuries. On Christmas Eve 2003, police foiled an attempt by ETA to blow up a train.
Hopes of a breakthrough in the long-running Basque conflict rose in May when Spain's parliament endorsed an unprecedented offer from the government to talk to ETA if it stopped violence.
ETA has sent mixed signals since then. It pledged in June to stop attacking elected politicians but a month later said it would still target members of the Spanish government.
This month, a Basque newspaper quoted ETA's internal bulletin as saying it would not call a cease-fire until the Spanish and French governments made concessions.
It has also stepped up the pace of small-scale bombings, but no one has been killed in an ETA attack since May 2003.
posted by Marko at 12/21/2005 06:52:00 PM
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