Friends of Move Updates
REPRESSION AGAINST THE BASQUE
POLITICAL PRISONERS:
DISPERSION, TORTURE AND BLACKMAIL
THERE ARE CLOSE TO 600 Basque political prisoners (BPP hereafter) scattered in jails in France and Spain, with the highest number of prisoners, approximately 540, in the Spanish State. The condition of prisons in France and Spain are harsh. To BPP is added that they are being moved and subject to violence. The present dispersion policy being applied to BPP is tantamount to isolating them from their relatives and friends. They are held in prisons outside Euskal Herria (Basque Country, in the Basque language) away from their homes, a treatment that violates current French and Spanish penitentiary legislation and European prison rules stating the right of prisoners to remain near their familiar environment.
French prisons are in better physical condition than the Spanish but overcrowded, the price of food is extremely high, medical care is deficient, and sanitary conditions fall far below the standard of European Prison Rules.
Living conditions in Spanish jails are inhuman and degrading. Prisons are old, overcrowded, lack ventilation, and food and hygiene are poor. Basque prisoners are subject to long periods of confinement and physical violence.
Different penitentiary policies have been applied to BPP since 1978. During the years 1978-1981, BPP were held in jails in Euskal Herria (Basauri, Martutene, and lrunea) for a brief period of time, then transferred to jails in Madrid and Soria, and finally to a jail in Cadiz, in southern Spain, 1,000 kilometers from Euskal Herria.
In 1983 they were transferred to the new maximum security prisons in Carabanchel and Alcala Meco in Madrid, and Herrera de Ia Mancha in Ciudad Real. They were held under military supervision and constant surveillance by means of closed-circuit cameras. Prison guards began to take a more active and direct role in the treatment of Basque prisoners: provocations, beatings, confinement, medical attention denied, etc. This was an extremely harsh period for Basque prisoners. They were held in total isolation, sometimes for a period of eleven months. Six BPP died at the Herrera de la Mancha Prison: Joseba Asenio Artaraz, in 1982, of an undetected tuberculosis, was denied medical attention; Juan JOse Crespo Galende, in 1983, from lack of medical assistance while on hunger-strike; Jose Retolaza Jodi, of skin cancer, was denied medical assistance; Mikel Lopetegi Larrarte, in 1988, a "suicide" according to the government; and Juan Carlos Alberdi Martiarena, in 1988, of a heart attack. Jose Ramon Goikoetxea died in 1985 at the Alcala-Meco Prison, a "suicide" according to the government.
The Spanish dispersion policy was applied for the first time to Basque political prisoners in 1974 during the dictatorship of Francisco Franco. Censhorship in 1974 prevented the Spanish magazine Cambio 16 from publishing the article "La ira de los politicos" on the hunger-strikes of the Basque and Spanish political prisoners. The magazine published the article in December 1995. The article mentions the dispersion of the political prisoners in several jails and special punishment cells and a "politica de premios y castigos (rebaja de condenas y mejores puestos, por un lado, y celdas de castigo y sotanos, por otro)." The article also noted that some of the prisoners had spent 17 months in jail waiting for their trial. Today, the current "anti-terrorist" legislation allows to hold a preventive prisoner up to four years.
Franco was the first one to disperse Basque prisoners but the Socialist government of Felipe Gonzalez redesigned a stronger and more machiavellian policy of dispersion and, in May 1989, began to apply it with the support of its regional allies.
The decision to disperse the Basque prisoners and hold them together with the social prisoners was promoted by Minister of Justice Enrique Mugica Herzog as a necessary measure to "encourage" their reinsertion.
Along with dispersion, "social reinsertion" was introduced. Reinsertion is promoted through blackmail. Under current Spanish legislation, a prisoner who has served three quarters of the sentence is entitled to provisional freedom. However this right has been consistently denied to BPP and granted only to those prisoners who agree to join a "social rehabilitation program" prior to their release and reject armed struggle. As of July 1996, 125 BPP had already served 3/4 of their sentences, some of them since six years ago. They are still being held.
Besides dispersion and blackmail, BPP are subject to physical violence and humiliation. They are beaten inside the prisons and during transfer from prison to prison and courts. They are ill-treated, humiliated and threatened with death by civil gruadsmen responsible for guarding them while in transit.
Prisoners are moved from prison to prison with the aim of making it impossible for them to settle. They are moved on infrahuman conditions: no ventilation, heavily handcuffed and sometimes under extreme temperatures. Transfers may take up to 18 hours during which time they are not allowed to get out of the van to attend their bodily functions. Many prisoners have fainted during transfers or got very ill.
Their families often don't know when the prisoners are being transferred or the final destination. In many occasions, relatives travel long distances to visit a prisoner only to find out that he or she has been transferred to another prison after the visit was confirmed by phone. Or relatives are notified that the prisoner was transferred and when they arrive to the notified new destination they find that the transfer had not taken place yet.
Many times too prisoners are taken out of jail and their whereabouts unknown for several days until they are allowed to notify their relatives of their new destiny.
Dispersion of BPP makes more difficult their defense as it is applied to both preventive and convicted prisoners. Lawyers appointed by them reside in Euskal Herria, hundreds of kilometers from the National Court in Madrid that handles their cases. Defendants in a same case are dispersed in different jails separated by great distance. This represents a great loss of time for the lawyers and a great economic cost for the families that have to pay for the displacement.
Therefore, dispersion reduces considerably the communication and contact among the lawyers and prisoners.
Prisoners are transferred to Madrid a few days before the trial is scheduled to begin and lawyers have a short period of time to prepare the defense. Besides, in cases with more than one defendant, lawyers are not allowed to prepare the defense in group but individually with each one of the defendants, and they are not allowed to communicate with prisoners who are going to testify as witnesses.
Prisoners need their lawyers for their defense as well as for advice on the many irregularities they have to face every day in the prison. Dispersion places limitations on the right to defense and judicial advice that Basque prisoners have, by preventing communication and contact between them and their lawyers.
BPP are often deprived of visits, letters, newspapers and books, and not allowed to communicate with other Basque prisoners in the same jail. They are often confined in total isolation for long periods of time. Some Basque prisoners have been held in total isolation for as long as six and eight months. They are often denied access to their lawyers and teachers, and their mail is checked; They are not allowed to use their language, Euskara (Basque language). BPP are forced to go on hunger-strikes; to protest against the arbitrary measures applied to them and demand better living conditions.
Eleven BPP have died since 1981, three in French jails and eight in Spanish jails. Notwithstanding the blackmail, beatings, the dispersion policy has failed majestically as the French and Spanish government have not been ale to break the will and morale of the BP or divide them.
Frequent demonstrations take place in Euskal Herria to denounce the situation of the BPP and demand their regrouping in prisons in their country.
In January 1996-the European parliament approved a resolution against the dispersion of prisoners; The International Observator of Prisons, the European Committee for the Prevention of Torture, and the Human Rights Commission of the United Nations have condemned the dispersion policy applied to Basque prisoners.
Despite the fact that the right of the BPP to be in jails in Euskal Herria has been consistently denied by the French and Spanish governments--notwithstanding the reports of international human rights organizations denouncing the critical situation of the BPP--Basques do not give working on this distressing case until all the prisoners are brought back to Euskal Herria and the suffering of the risoners and their families eased.
Last December over 50,000 people marched in the Basque city of Bilbo in support of the Basque political prisoners and their regrouping in jails in Euskal Herria.
Excerpted from Move Newspaper, FIRST DAY, Issue # 20
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