Basque peacemakers seek mediator

The popular mood against violence is growing

By Flora Botsford in Madrid

A leading Basque peace group says it has collected 45,000 signatures and 45m pesetas ($280,000) from ordinary members of the public in support of a peace conference to be held in the autumn.

The group, Elkarri, is also hoping to attract leading international peace-makers to help solve the Basque conflict.

The idea of the campaign is that everyone who signs the petition in favour of a Basque peace conference also gives 1,000 pesetas (about $6) as a pledge of personal commitment.

Elkarri says the campaign has been a success, and now the race is on to find international sponsors for the conference.

Extremism declining

While names like Senator George Mitchell were mentioned when the process began, Elkarri will only say that it has 18 personalities from European institutions giving their backing.

The ETA separatist group has killed 11 people this year

One of the potential problems for Elkarri in this respect, is that the group is not planning to hold the conference on a particular date or in a particular location.

Instead, Elkarri sees it as a six month period of negotiation and dialogue.

Although there will be a series of public debates, no political parties are directly involved and Elkarri believes the most important work will be done by negotiators talking individually to as many people as possible.

While ETA's violent campaign for Basque independence continues, Elkarri says the result of regional elections in May proves that support for such extremism has gone down - by half in fact, to less than 10% of voters.

The majority of people in the Basque country voted in favour of parties supporting non-violence and dialogue.