On Wednesday, Francisco Garcia Gaztelu, a former leader of the separatist group Euskadi Ta Azkatasuna (ETA), was sentenced to 60 years in jail by the court. He was found guilty of ordering the killing of Jose Javier Mugica, a member of the political party Union del Pueblo Navarra (UPN) in Letiza town during 2001.

The Spanish National Court has sentenced four members of a separatist group ETA to jail for over 50 years. ETA is a terrorist organisation by Spain, the US and the European Union (EU). Its 45-year campaign of violence has left over 800 people as dead.

Juan Carlos Besance, an ETA member, was condemned to 58 years prison for his role in the same crime, while other two members of this group i.e. Andoni Otegi and Oscar Celarain were sentenced to 50 years each as well and ordered to pay 500,000 Euros (over $670,000) in compensation to Mugica’s widow also.

This group ETA was first emerged in the 1960s as a student resistance movement and waged a bloody campaign for independence for the seven regions in northern Spain and south-west France that this separatist group claims as their own.

Four separatists jailed for over 50 years in Spain

Report by Dushyant Tiwari