The sports category has moved to a new website.
ADVERTISEMENT

Basque separatist group - key dates in history

Basque separatist leader Arnaldo Otegi speaks with AFP journalists during an interview in the northern Spanish Basque village of Renteria on April 6, 2017

The group has been blamed for the death of 829 people in a campaign of violence that totalled 43 years.

1959: Creation of Euskadi Ta Askatasuna (ETA), meaning Basque Homeland and Liberty, by Basque nationalist students inspired by revolutionary movements in the Third World.

1960s: Initially an organisation promoting culture and identity in the Basque country straddling the French-Spanish border, ETA mutates into a paramilitary group.

1968: Policeman is shot dead in the Spanish Basque town of San Sebastian, becoming the first killing to be officially attributed to ETA.

ADVERTISEMENT

1973: ETA car bomb kills Prime Minister Luis Carrero Blanco, a key figure in the Franco military dictatorship.

1977: Spain's first democratic government after Franco's death declares amnesty for political prisoners, including detained ETA members.

1979: Spain gives autonomy to Spanish Basque country.

1980: Bloodiest year in ETA's campaign, with 92 dead.

1983: Emergency of shadowy death squads called GAL (Antiterrorist Liberation Groups), later linked to the Spanish interior ministry, which begin campaign of assassination of ETA figures. Twenty-eight are killed over the next four years.

ADVERTISEMENT

1987: Twenty-one people are killed in a car bomb in Barcelona, northeastern Spain, in ETA's bloodiest single attack.

1997: Miguel Angel Blanco, a young local politician for the conservative People's Party, is kidnapped by ETA and subsequently murdered. His killing sparks mass protests against ETA.

1998: ETA declares unilateral and unlimited truce, which it calls off in late 1999 after breakdown of talks with the government.

2003: ETA's political wing, Batasuna, is banned.

2006: ETA announces a "permanent ceasefire" which ends within months with a bomb attack at Madrid airport in which two people are killed.

ADVERTISEMENT

2008: Major blow to ETA with arrests of senior members, including military chief Garikoitz Aspiazu Rubina, nicknamed "Txeroki".

2009: ETA carries out its last attacks on Spanish soil. In March 2010 a French policeman in the Paris area is killed in a car chase.

2011: On October 20 2011, ETA announces the "definitive halt to (its) armed activity" and proposes disarmament in exchange for an amnesty for ETA prisoners. The Spanish government rejects the proposal.

2017: ETA announces it will hand over all its remaining weapons on Saturday April 8, describing itself as a "disarmed organisation."

JOIN OUR PULSE COMMUNITY!

Unblock notifications in browser settings.
ADVERTISEMENT

Eyewitness? Submit your stories now via social or:

Email: news@pulselive.co.ke

Recommended articles

Marianne Kitany tactfully speaks on whether Ruto should fire her ex, CS Linturi

Marianne Kitany tactfully speaks on whether Ruto should fire her ex, CS Linturi

Gov't & opposition officials clash at Rita Tinina's burial ceremony

Gov't & opposition officials clash at Rita Tinina's burial ceremony

CS Murkomen unveils new number plates for cars that will get preferential treatment

CS Murkomen unveils new number plates for cars that will get preferential treatment

Moi University students escape through windows after road crash

Moi University students escape through windows after road crash

57,000 civil servants to have their rent reviewed upwards

57,000 civil servants to have their rent reviewed upwards

Interesting story of U.S. Army Specialist Wambui who comes from a military family

Interesting story of U.S. Army Specialist Wambui who comes from a military family

Heroic GSU officer dies after jumping out of a taxi along Thika Super Highway

Heroic GSU officer dies after jumping out of a taxi along Thika Super Highway

DJ Joe Mfalme detained for 14 more days

DJ Joe Mfalme detained for 14 more days

Explosive blows up hotel next to police station, deaths reported

Explosive blows up hotel next to police station, deaths reported

ADVERTISEMENT