| Spain lifts ban on Basque party with links to ETA |
MADRID Spain’s constitutional court has ruled that a previously banned Basque independence party with links to the armed separatist group ETA can reform, a judicial source said late on Wednesday.
The constitutional court was very split on the ruling, which was made with six members in favour and five against, a judicial source said.
The government was swift to show its disappointment at the decision, insisting that ETA must disband completely.
“ETA has no other choice but to disband without conditions and the government will certainly not stop until that has been obtained,” said interior minister Jorge Fernandez Diaz.
Sortu was created in early 2011 by members of Batasuna, the political wing of ETA that has been banned from political life since 2003, in a bid by the movement to participate in local elections.
However Spain viewed the creation of Sortu as a way for ETA to infiltrate the government and outlawed it in March last year.
Instead Batasuna formed a successful coalition with two legal independence parties Eusko Alkartasuna and Alternatiba that went on to become the second biggest party in local elections in May 2011.
The ruling means that Sortu will be able to stand in regional elections slated for 2013.
Batasuna claims it no longer has ties with ETA, which itself announced last October the “definitive” end to its campaign of violence, though it has refused to disband completely.
ETA is blamed for the deaths of over 800 people in more than 40 years of bombing and shooting for an independent Basque homeland in northern Spain and southern France.
Separately, the United States put a Aitzol Iriondo Yarza, leader of the Basque ETA movement, detained in France on its list of terrorists, freezing any assets he may have within US territory.
Yarza was awaiting extradition to Spain on terrorism and murder charges, the State Department said.
Agence France-Presse
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