Madrid bombings verdicts fail to heal Spain

Oct 31, 2007, 21:24 GMT

Moroccan Otman el Gnaoui (R), one of the 28 defendants charged in connection with the 11 March 2004 Madrid bomb attacks that killed 191 people, is being sentenced to 42,924 years in jail for murder and additional crimes Audiencia Nacional Court in the Parque Ferial Juan Carlos I in Madrid, Spain, 31 October 2007. Otman el Gnaoui was one of three men sentenced to thousands of years in prison, though by Spanish law they can only serve 40 years maximum. EPA/PACO CAMPOS /POOL

Madrid - For people who lost family members or were maimed for life in the 2004 Madrid train bombings, Wednesday should have been a day of healing.

Spain's National Court finally issued verdicts for the men accused of staging Europe's worst al-Qaeda-linked bloodbath, sentencing 21 people to prison for involvement in the deaths of 191 and injuries caused to more than 1,800 people, or for related charges.

Moroccan Jamal Zougam, who was sentenced to more than 40,000 years, and other terrorists entered four Madrid commuter trains on March 11, 2004, the court said.

Using dynamite supplied by Spanish explosives trafficker Emilio Suarez Trashorras, who was sentenced to nearly 35,000 years, the attackers planted bombs on the trains, got off and detonated the bombs.

Zougam's accomplice Otman el-Gnaoui was also handed more than 40,000 years. Three suspected masterminds behind the bombings, however, were acquitted of planning them.

The verdicts were intended to bring out the truth about the attack and to finally let the dead rest in peace, but that did not happen.

The verdicts failed to satisfy victims crying outside the court house, who described the prison sentences as too modest and the acquittal of seven suspects as another outrage.

'Justice has not been done,' said the parents of Luis Tenesaca, 17, who died in the bombings. 'We will soon be forgotten, while some of the culprits remain at large.'

Both victims' associations and the convicts were expected to appeal to the Supreme Court.

Not only did the sentences given the accused disappoint the victims, but doubt continued to linger about who was really behind the attack.

The court left no doubt that it was carried out by jihadists intent on 'defeating democratic regimes and eliminating Christian and Western culture to replace it with an Islamic state.'

The Madrid bombers did not act on orders from al-Qaeda, but were inspired by its ideas and may have heeded its call on Muslims to punish Spain for its support of the Iraq war, according to evidence presented at the trial.

The court categorically denied any involvement by the Basque separatist group ETA, but politically conservative victims, lawyers and politicians refused to let go of that idea, stressing that the court had failed to convict anyone of planning the attack.

'Somebody had to give the order' to the bombers, said Jose Maria de Pablo, a lawyer representing a victims' association close to the opposition conservative People's Party (PP).

Unlike the United States after the attacks of September 11, 2001 and Britain after those of July 2005, Spain was fast in capturing the Madrid suspects and in bringing them to trial.

But unlike in the United States, where the attacks united the nation, the Madrid bombings divided Spaniards over the question of Basque involvement.

The controversy goes back to the aftermath of the bombings, when the conservative government is believed to have lost the elections over suspicions that it caused the attack by allying with the United States in Iraq.

The government initially blamed the bombings on ETA, prompting accusations that it was lying in an attempt to cover up its responsibility and to pre-empt an electoral defeat.

The question of ETA's involvement continued to be present throughout the trial, sparking heated exchanges in the court room and a media battle between conservative newspapers and those close to the Socialist government.

'The truth' had now come out, Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero said after the verdicts were announced, but PP leader Mariano Rajoy said he would back any new investigations into the Madrid bombings.

New court cases are indeed expected to follow, for instance against some suspects who have not yet faced trial.