It seems that it will last little longer permanent ceasefire. “ETA va a suspender el proceso en diez o quince días“.
His words are clear and forceful: “In 10 or 15 days we will have a statement from ETA in the sense of suspending the indefinite ceasefire“. The words of Txema Montero, historic lawyer the union, They coincide with the ultimatum given by the band: the 21 de diciembre. He “process” comes to an end?
No one is aware that the dialogue process undertaken by the Government with ETA is not going through a good moment. He said it Otegui, confirmed it Rubalcaba and now he adds it Txema Montero, historic leader of Batasuna. He does this during an interview granted to a Alberto Surio, in Vasco Journal. I leave you with her:
Without hiding his pessimism, The lawyer and former leader of Batasuna Txema Montero believes that "the peace process has derailed" and believes that Basque society must internalize that a possible failure will be the sole responsibility of ETA..
– What is your diagnosis?
– With caution I would say that the process is stalled, but I think it is more than stagnant. I think that as it was designed in the sense of two tables - normalization and pacification- that they were advancing almost in parallel and that they were not going to have a relationship between the two, has derailed. The two-way negotiation has failed. Now it's time to do the impossible so that this doesn't come to nothing definitively..
– What is it based on??
– How ETA has rearmed itself during the peace process, which is a contradiction in itself; The Government has not been able to offer gestures of detente or even to paralyze judicial proceedings, that have been taken into account by ETA and Batasuna as attacks during the process; and, for being graphics, The break that ETA gave to its political representatives is over and it returns to what is already known. He has given them two dry and forceful slaps, which were the act of Aritxulegi and then the theft of the pistols. Perhaps because they consider that they do not earn the political beans for themselves, perhaps because the dynamic that was being generated in the second political table of increasingly closer commitment was reaching a point of difficult return for ETA.. That commitment, that complicity, that leaving hair in the cat flap, was leading ETA to a situation in which they could no longer control the following. So that a peace process, namely, acceptance of the democratic principle of majorities has a basis, it must be protected by a detente. I reproach Zapatero for not having taken steps and not having sought the complicity of society in difficult moments.
– Isn't the feeling of being in a historic opportunity a guarantee to avoid a breakup??
– It's just that we all already devalue the historical term. We have to make an effort with language in the face of rhetorical excess. I remember what Don Quixote said of the Biscayans and, by extension, of the basques: «Short in words and long in deeds». Now it's almost the other way around. History in, but an opportunity like none before, yes.
– There have been no murders in three and a half years…
– It is an ephemeral fact because in the end they can kill in three weeks and return to the previous situation. The general impression sent to ETA is that its time is up, It's only up to them to find out. We have the rest more than clear. If we go back to our old ways, I'm not saying there will be an open war., but there will be an icy social relationship with all these people that will give them a feeling of rejection much greater than any cascade of insults they receive..
– And now what?
– I think that in 10 or 15 In a few days we will have a statement from ETA suspending the indefinite ceasefire and a wait-and-see situation over Christmas and the first two or three weeks of January.. And as a result of the decisions they make, that will also have to do with the positions that the rest of us take, reconsider its suspension of provisionally paralyzing the ceasefire, or they will return directly to the armed struggle. At the end of January we will know.
– So you think this is broken?
– I'm inclined to think so.
«Skeptical society»
– Lack of maturity? Wasn't this situation more mature than in 1998?
– On the one hand, each situation is always more mature than the previous one.. The peace processes have had many drawbacks, particularly the most notable is a growing skepticism in society. I would specify that it is easier to mobilize society against ETA than to mobilize it in favor of a peace process.. This should make us think. So much peace process has come to make us skeptical. The moment ETA declared a ceasefire, people began to live as if we were already settled in peace., with which each new setback generates more skepticism than the previous one. Which at the same time is a learning. And I believe that from this process the learning has been for everyone to know where the limits of political reality are.. The Government has had to discover the existence of creative judges, of hysterical media and an opposition playing all or nothing. And ETA has learned that dialogue has its contradictions and that a peace process entails complexity, especially when a peace process takes place within a democratic society, which is one of the differentiating elements of the peace process in Euskadi and Ireland from other processes. In the end, The paradox for ETA is to perceive that the end of a peace process is to assume representative democracy on their part., no more no less, that can lead us Basques to have a status similar to that of the Flemish in Belgium, no more no less, or the Swedish minority in Finland, but it is not a catharsis where a new state plant is going to be created. And I say neither more nor less because in our case it is a lot. Have a 15 or 18% in a parliament of seven political forces and being the first force in one of the territories is an accumulation of power and political possibilities that they are not able to perceive because deep down they may think: “This was not what we were after.”. Because that is commitment, the consensus. There is no longer an epic of resistance. It's something they should have done many years ago.. And therein lies the paradox. For them too there is a clear feeling of being scammed..
-Because?
-The thing is that I am also in some way a participant in that feeling when I have seen that in other processes in a democratic society, and the only one that comes to mind is the one in the north of Ireland, Along with the situation of dialogue and ceasefire, there has been a de facto détente where there were no police raids or police interventions.. ETA's reading is that they have never made such an important effort with a ceasefire declaration and never in a situation like this have they received so much police and judicial pressure. ETA's two red lines have always been: the first, that there is no split in your organization and the second, that her closest social base supports her. Maybe because there was no split, Decisions within ETA are made with a small majority both to decide the ceasefire and to later cease it.. And that social base, not the broad spectrum of voters, He tells you since the month of May: The only thing we notice is that they hit us in every corner.
"There will be no split"
-And a hypothetical breach of the ceasefire, what consequence would it have? Maybe a new split?
-A first consequence was going to be attacks with deaths. There I disagree with those who think that ETA would return through a kind of fantasy terrorism by placing bombs in more or less emblematic places.. Because the IRA can do that., which is much stronger militarily. Nothing more eloquent and irreversible for everyone than murder. The next reaction on the part of the State is going to be to put a number of people in prison, not only from ETA - which the French Police will take care of with chilling certainty for them.- but there will be arrests of members of Batasuna as we have not known until now, pending cases… Split within the Abertzale left? No, because the nationalist left has never split when it has been subjected to very strong external pressure, that reduces and concentrates the core of believers. What does occur is the voice and output mechanism. Like the rest of the people who do not agree with maximalist interpretations, Ekin and KAS type, those who in the assemblies that have taken place in the last four or five weeks do not find a voice of expression, the hall, They demobilize and in the end they do not vote. It's the inertia of the past.
-Does it weigh that much?
-It's weighing a lot. There has been a lack of sufficient democratic commitment from the leaders of Batasuna and sufficient pedagogy to clearly explain to them, to tell them that the concept of process is dynamic, is not equivalent to the granting of the KAS alternative, that it is a path that we all begin to walk together and that may not even take us where we intend.. And that the road is as important as the inn. We must convey very clearly to society that the only person responsible for what happens with the failure of the process is ETA if it returns to political violence.. And we can make this much more credible if we overcome this crisis situation or accept the result of a failure with a common strategy from the political forces of democracy..
-How do you think the PNV is acting??
-It is likely that the PNV is being a victim of its own suspicions. When this process began, he thought that everything was much more tied and outlined and he thought that a peace process could end with the ousting of the PNV in government institutions.. The advantage is that there is an axis of certain stability from democratic institutions. It would have been terrifying if the State Government had been involved in this matter, with a wild PP and the PNV playing the harp on Mount Gorbea. As an observer, I believe that in some cases the PNV has failed to give serious warnings to the central government and the PSOE..
-How to resolve the legalization of the Abertzale left?
-That should be the point of commitment that many of us expect, to accept legalization in accordance with the Political Parties Law. I should assume it. I don't like it, I discussed it publicly at conferences, It seems to me to be a terrible law that is being rigorously applied., but the assumption of that principle of legality of that bad law with a commitment on the part of Batasuna can give all of us enough oxygen.
«Peace in Euskadi is going to be different from others»
-The Sabino Arana Foundation seminar concluded that the process is not irreversible…
-No process is irreversible. We must all learn from peace processes. And learn to compare the comparable. Negotiating with someone in Africa who is declared an enemy of humanity because he has committed genocide is not comparable to what we do.. I was left with an interpretation that seems more interesting to me of a maxim of Confucius that says: The nature of war determines the nature of peace and whether war, How ETA calls its confrontation with the State, It has been like ours, where reconciliation is necessary, but not the reconstruction because nothing has been physically broken, because we are better off financially than when we started, but there is great moral damage, peace will be different from other peaces. It will be the expansion of a representative democracy, but nothing more. Is this enough for people who have lived through all this as if it were a war?? Sometimes I get pessimistic and think that no.
-Because?
-For some of them, who have much to gain - their personal freedom, because they are in jail and waiting for grace measures- and for their families, peace is something tangible. But others, who have had no more commitment than accession, who have lived perfectly during these years, and they are part of those who are against the process, You may wonder, and all that was for this??, And what difference does it make to me if I'm going to continue living the same?? Lifting the veil after violence, We find that they will have to learn to negotiate with other political forces because they do not have a sufficient base to be able to transform things..
Alberto Surio interviewing the Txema Montero. Extracted entirely of Basque newspaper.