10.000 basques have been tortured in the Spanish state for the past 50 years. 40.000 politically-related arrested basques over 53 years an more than 30.000 were not later charged.

That in a country of barely three million people some ten thousand cases of torture have been documented is an indicator of the brutality that has characterized the state in their repression of the Basque independence movement, and the fact that the cases have maintained throughout time an example that the this repression hasn’t changed with regimes or governments. Torture has always been understood by Madrid as one more tool in their policy towards this people.

An example that torture has been a strategy of the state against the Basque Country is to realize that there have only been 19 convictions condemning torture. Altogether, no more than 62 agents of the state’s security forces have been condemned for torturing Basque citizens. And what is even more shameful, more than half of those condemned, a total of 36 have been pardoned by the governments of the PP or the PSOE.

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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kOlrOwf_O5g

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r_iaxiJ_QAM

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KGLi0ii9Jfs

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-3Ra9UAGzC8

Spanish High Court judge Baltasar Garzón complied with the protocol regarding the people held under arrest after the police operation executed in Biscay in July 2008, and, in theory, the Guardia Civil (a Spanish police force) adopted several due procedures concerning those under arrest; meanwhile, the Guardia Civil video-recorded the arrest. During the oral trial some images taken in the cells were shown: the arrested people along with the policemen can be seen to and fro the corridors of the jail — Arkaitz Goikoetxea, Iñigo Gutierrez, Maialen Zuazo and Anabel Prieto-

The documentary gathers together the statements made by those tortured under police arrest by the police, the assessements of lawyers and experts, and the images shown in the trial. The work is made in Spanish with Basque, French and English subtitles.

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120 hours. Torture against the Basque Country

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l0dk3vvILUc#at=2104

English subtitles

Eguzki bideoak

“120 horas, la tortura contra Euskal Herria”; un documental que trata de explicar los recobecos de la tortura y su uso en la actualidad. Este método con el que sonsacar información o con el que forzar a admitir una información que puede o no ser cierta, ha sido aplicada de manera sistemática a muchas de las personas detenidas que participaban en el movimiento social de euskal herria.

A través de entrevistas a personas que han sufrido esta práctica ruin y otras que han analizado con detenimiento esta realidad, como abogadas, médicas y activistas especializadas conoceremos por qué todavía es posible que la tortura se aplique, considerando que nos encontramos en un supuesto sistema democrático donde se preservan los derechos civiles y humanos, y cuáles podrían ser los mecanismos para erradicar esta realidad que los vulnera de manera radical.

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TORTURE AGAINST THE BASQUES

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+ España: Criminales de guerra y crímenes de lesa humanidad

+ Desde la asfixia y la oscuridad de la bolsa