| Submit your comments on this article | |
| Europe | |
| ETA to follow Kosovo example | |
| 2008-01-05 | |
BILBAO -- The Basque separatist group ETA will base its calls for independence on the example set by Kosovo, says local daily Gara.
It was not possible to get any details of the interview from the paperÂ’s editors, nor were the names of any of the groupÂ’s members mentioned. ETA uses Gara, among other papers, to send messages or publish its statements. "This nation has a right to its own development," says ETA, which has been responsible for 819 murders in the last 40 years in Spain in its fight for the Basque country's independence. Kosovo officials say that they will soon declare independence against the wishes of the Serbian authorities. In Scotland, the Scottish National Party secured a majority in elections to the Scottish parliament in May, and is looking to hold a referendum for independence in 2010. Basque leaders wish to hold a similar referendum in the same year. | |
| Posted by:Anonymoose |
| #3 Deacon, send word to Task Force Dothan, we moobileze on um..... next Tuesday. |
| Posted by: Thomas Woof 2008-01-05 16:07 |
| #2 And it will be just a short time until waterborne Spanish immigrants launch their liberation movement, to be followed shortly by like-minded sorts in the English midlands, and the Moros rejuvenate, and then splinter groups in Assam, and then the Uigers, and so on and so on, and there's a large Somali population in Augusta, Maine, correct? |
| Posted by: Glung McGurque2454 2008-01-05 15:20 |
| #1 Spain feels it must fiercely hold on to the Basque region, because if it separates, then other regions will follow: (from the Wiki) "The Spanish Constitution, in its second article, declares that Spain is an indissoluble nation that recognizes and guarantees the right to self-government of the "nationalities" and regions that constitute it. Catalonia, alongside Basque Country, Galicia and Andalusia self-ascribed as "nationalities" in the elaborations of their Statutes of Autonomy –the first three acceding to autonomy automatically– and more recently in their new Statutes or recent amendments Aragon, the Valencian Community, the Balearic Islands and the Canary Islands also did. The 1979 as well as the current Statute of Autonomy, approved in 2006, state that "Catalonia, as a nationality, exercises its self-government constituted as an autonomous community in accordance with the Constitution and with the Statute of Autonomy of Catalonia, which is its basic institutional law." The descriptive preamble of the 2006 Statute of Autonomy of Catalonia states the Parliament of Catalonia defined Catalonia as a nation, but that the "Spanish Constitution recognizes Catalonia's national reality as a nationality". While this Statute was approved by and sanctioned by both the Catalan and the Spanish parliaments, and later by referendum in Catalonia, it has been legally contested by the surrounding Autonomous Communities of Aragon, Balearic Islands and the Valencian Community, as well as by the Partido Popular. The objections are based on various topics such as disputed cultural heritage but, specially, on the Statute alleged breaches of the "solidarity between regions" principle enshrined by the Constitution in fiscal and educational matters. As of December 2007, the Constitutional Court of Spain is assessing the constitutionality of the challenged articles, its binding assessment is expected for 2008. |
| Posted by: Anonymoose 2008-01-05 10:21 |