Pro-independence Basque demonstrators gather on the street during a protest in Bilbao.

Pro-independence Basque demonstrators gather on the street during a protest in Bilbao.

TENS OF THOUSANDS of protesters in Spain’s Basque Country defied Madrid on Saturday by holding a mass demonstration marked by tensions over jailed members of the armed separatist group ETA.

Crowds filled the streets in the northern city of Bilbao in a march for “human rights, understanding and peace”, after a judge banned another demonstration planned to demand concessions for the prisoners.

The treatment of imprisoned ETA convicts is one of the most delicate issues in a standoff between the authorities and western Europe’s last major armed secessionist movement.

ETA is blamed for 829 killings in its campaign for an independent Basque homeland in northern Spain and southwestern France.

Sensitivities flared last month when prisoners’ groups pushed for concessions from authorities, outraging victims’ families.

A judge at Madrid’s top criminal court yesterday delivered a ruling prohibiting a demonstration that was called explicitly in support of the prisoners, saying it was organised by a banned group.

Basque nationalist and separatist political parties then weighed in, calling a new “rights” march this evening.

The banned demonstration was to call for jailed ETA members to be moved to prisons closer to their families.

One of them, Itziar Goienetxia, 52, said she lived in the Basque country and had to travel 1,200 kilometres there and back for a 40-minute visit to her husband in jail in the southern town of Cadiz.

“It’s a double sentence,” affecting her as well as the prisoner, she told AFP as she came to join Saturday evening’s march.

The conservative Basque National Party which governs the region and a left-wing pro-independence grouping joined forces in calling the march, in a rare joint show of strength.

Between them they accounted for more than half of the votes in the last regional elections, as pro-independence Basques set their sights on a political solution.

“Political parties and unions that represent the political majority of this land decided they had to call this demonstration to defend the right to freedom of expression,” Pernando Barrena, spokesman for left-wing party Sortu, told AFP.

The spokesman for the regional government, Josu Erkoreka, earlier said the ban was “incomprehensible to the Basque people”.

The victims’ association AVT applied to have the new demonstration banned too, saying it gave “grave offence to each and every victim of terrorism,” in a statement.

“The only aim of the initiative is to pay homage to prisoners of the terrorist group ETA,” the association said.

A judge today ruled that the new gathering called by the parties was not illegal however, a court source said.

© – AFP 2014