Basque Militants Declare Permanent Cease-Fire in Spain

The militant Basque separatist group ETA declared a permanent cease-fire today in what it called a firm step toward ending its bloody, decades-long independence fight—but the Spanish government quickly demanded it disband outright. Masked ETA members announced the cease-fire in a video distributed to Spanish media, and ETA's statement also appeared on the website of pro-independence newspaper Gara, which often serves as an ETA mouthpiece.

But the statement made no mention of ETA dissolving or giving up its weapons—key demands from successive Spanish governments—and the announcement follows what the group called a permanent cease-fire in 2006 that ended after only nine months. A top Spanish official said Spanish governments and mainstream Spanish political parties have maintained that all they want to hear from ETA is that it is disarming and giving up. ETA's last deadly attack was in 2009.
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