France detains eight Basque separatist suspects (Roundup)

Nov 4, 2008, 14:07 GMT

Madrid/Paris - French police Tuesday detained eight suspected Basque separatists, French and Spanish media reported.

The arrests were made in connection with an investigation into bars linked with Batasuna, a party regarded as the political wing of the militant group ETA.

The bars were also suspected of financing French Basque radicals who have carried out attacks against restaurants and other establishments, Spanish police sources said.

Arrests were made in different locations in the French Basque region, according to Askatasuna, a group defending jailed ETA activists.

The detainees were taken to a police station in Bayonne. Police searched several addresses.

Some of the detainees belonged to Batasuna, which is banned in Spain but legal in France.

Several of the detainees had previously been sentenced for collaborating with ETA.

Over the weekend, police discovered an ETA camp north-east of Bordeaux, seizing documents and a hard disk, the French daily Sud Ouest reported.

ETA's campaign for Basque independence focuses on fighting the Spanish state, but the group has long had a part of its infrastructure based in France.

ETA's most recent attack injured 17 people with a car bomb in Pamplona, northern Spain, last week.

ETA, which is listed as a terrorist organization by the European Union and the United States, has killed more than 820 people since 1968.