Bombing kills 2 in Northern Spain

 

 

The Report:

 

MADRID, Spain (CNN) -- An explosion killed two police officers and wounded two other people on Friday in northern Spain in an attack that bore the hallmarks of the Basque separatist group ETA, officials said.

The explosion occurred at 12:25 p.m. (1025 GMT) in the northern town of Sanguesa, near Pamplona, a spokesman for the Interior Ministry in northern Navarra Province told CNN.

Of the two people injured, one was a police officer who sustained serious wounds, and the other was a civilian with lesser injuries, the spokesman added.

Spain's Deputy Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy blamed the attack on ETA.

He said in a nationally televised news conference after the weekly Cabinet meeting: "ETA has again carried out an attack. ETA again has killed. We will keep fighting, within the law, against the terrorist band."

It was not immediately clear if the bomb was inside a car, or attached to it, the spokesman told CNN. But CNN partner station CNN+, citing Spanish news reports, said the device was a limpet bomb attached to an undetermined part of the police car.

As a result of the attack, Spanish Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar canceled his planned trip to St. Petersburg, Russia, for the commemoration of that city's 300th anniversary, an aide to Aznar told CNN.

Aznar had planned to go to St. Petersburg for a dinner with other world leaders Friday night and a working session of the European Union with Russia Saturday morning.

It was not immediately clear if Aznar would go to the site of the explosion, about 400 kilometers (250 miles) northeast of Madrid. Sanguesa is about 70 kilometers from Pamplona.

His Interior Minister Angel Acebes has gone to the site.

Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, leader of Spain's main opposition Socialist Party, said at a news conference, that while voters spoke last Sunday throughout Spain in local elections, on Friday "the assassins spoke."

"That's how ETA speaks," he added. "I reiterate our commitment to eradicate this violence, which will never achieve its goals."

ETA is blamed for more than 800 killings in its decades-long campaign for Basque independence. ETA is listed as a terrorist group by the United States and the European Union.

Before Friday's attack, ETA was blamed for only one killing this year -- that of a policeman in February.

Police have arrested more than 60 ETA suspects in Spain and France this year in a continuing crackdown.

Friday's explosion comes just days after municipal elections across Spain in which Batasuna, the political group linked to ETA, was banned from running candidates.

Batasuna supporters cast protest ballots that did not officially count, but which polling stations nonetheless tallied. About 128,000 votes were cast for the banned candidates. ('Close result')

In an interview with CNN partner station CNN+, Patxi Lopez, leader of the Socialist Party in the northern Basque region, blamed the attack on ETA.

http://edition.cnn.com/2003/WORLD/europe/05/30/spain.bomb/index.html