Alison Dellit
About 8 million people across Spain rallied on March 12, to protest against political violence. The protests were very broad — Popular Party ministers joining anti-war activists and others. The largest protest was in Barcelona, where 2 million marched.
While the demonstrations were mostly silent affairs, things got rowdier as some of them broke up. Some of the many youth at the protests started chanting anti-war and anti-government slogans in Madrid and other provincial centres. In Barcelona, government ministers were spirited away by police.
On March 13, Reuters reported that spontaneous anti-government protests took place in many cities on that evening, 5000 protesting outside the PP offices in Madrid. Protesters condemned the government's manipulation of the March 11 bombings.
Also on that evening, interior minister Angel Acebes announced that five men had been arrested for the bombings, and that police had found a videotape claiming responsibility for the bombings for al Qaeda.
Given that the suspects were not Spanish (never mind Basque), the press has speculated that this indicated a turnaround on behalf of the government, to investigating al Qaeda instead of to the armed Basque independence organisation ETA for the bombings.
However, Acebes refused to rule out ETA involvement, instead saying that "investigations are ongoing".
From Â鶹´«Ã½ Weekly, March 17, 2004.
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