ETA prisoners announce hunger strike in Spain and France (Roundup)

Jan 25, 2010, 16:52 GMT

Madrid - Imprisoned members of the militant Basque separatist group ETA said Monday they were launching a hunger strike in Spanish and French jails.

Spanish Interior Minister Alfredo Perez Rubalcaba said the protest would not make the government change its penitentiary policy even by 'an inch.'

The inmates were protesting Spain's policy of placing them in separate prisons far from the Basque region. They were also requesting their recognition as political prisoners, reported the Basque newspaper Gara, quoting a communique from EPPK, an association representing the prisoners.

EPPK said the hunger strike was part of a string of protests launched in early January, which included fasting, not making use of opportunities to make phone calls or to go out to the prison yard.

Spanish and French prisons hold more than 700 people who have been sentenced for belonging to or collaborating with ETA.

However, the ongoing protests have had an unequal and sometimes scarce following among the inmates, according to sources of the Spanish prison administration.

Several ETA prisoners are believed to have distanced themselves from the organization and to have called for an end to its armed strategy in attempts to create a sovereign Basque state.

ETA accuses the government of inhuman policies in placing its jailed members so far from the Basque region that their family members must travel hundreds of kilometres to visit them. Rubalcaba said the government maintained its policy of giving preferential treatment to prisoners who repented and renounced violence.

ETA has killed more than 820 people since 1968.