Does ETA have public support?

There was strong support for ETA in the Basque provinces during Franco’s reign and into the 1980s: more than half of those surveyed in a poll there in 1979 felt ETA’s militants were ‘patriots’ or ‘idealists’. However, in general, support for ETA has waned since the Franco years as the group sought civilian rather than military targets and its actions became increasingly bloody. In 1997, 6 million Spaniards protested against ETA’s killing of a young local councillor from the Basque region.

Recently ETA’s strength has been sapped further; its political wing was banned in 2003, and, despite broken ceasefires and continued car-bomb attacks on politicians, judges and journalists, the Spanish government—under the leadership of Jos? Luis Rodriguez Zapatero since 2004—seems to be winning the battle against the organisation. ETA’s military commander Garikoitz Aspiazu Rubina and suspected leader Javier L?pez Pe?a were both caught in 2008; in all some 750 suspected members of the organisation have been detained since 2000. In March 2009, ETA suffered another big blow when 29 years of nationalist domination in the Basque Country came to an end as the Basque Nationalist Party failed to muster a majority in the region’s elections. This paved the way for the Socialist Party and Popular Party to create an informal coalition. They strongly support the Basque Country remaining part of Spain, and have promised to boost funding to combat ETA.

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