Spain has asked the United States to use its talks on taking Cuba off the blacklist of countries sponsoring terrorism to help obtain the extradition of two members of the armed Basque group Eta from the communist country.

The foreign minister, José Manuel García Margallo, said on Monday that the government has been in talks with the US in the hope of getting Cuba to extradite José Ángel Urtiaga and José Ignacio Etxarte to Spain.

They have been wanted since 2010 in an investigation into alleged links between Venezuela, Eta and Colombian rebel group Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia ( Farc).

Cuba’s 33-year status on the terrorism list stems from its support decades ago for Eta and Farc.

The list is a major hurdle in US-Cuban negotiations to end a half-century diplomatic freeze.

Margallo said the extraditions have since been made more difficult by the former socialist prime minister, José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, who last week called on the US to take Cuba off the list immediately and without conditions.

Zapatero’s comments in Havana after meeting the Cuban president, Raúl Castro, during a private visit greatly angered the conservative Madrid government.

Margallo said Zapatero had not informed the government of the meeting with Castro and should have contacted the ministry before making such statements.

Urtiaga and Etxarte are believed to have been in Cuba since the mid-1980s. Spain’s national court said the two sought permission from Eta to carry out grenade- and mortar-launching tests in Venezuela in cooperation with Farc.

Eta killed some 830 people in a four-decade-long campaign for a Basque homeland. It declared a permanent ceasefire in 2011 but has yet to disband.