2006/X/30
Iñaki de Juana, the tip of the iceberg

On October 7 a large demonstration marched through the streets of Donostia to demand the rights of Basque political prisoners be upheld.
Specifically, the demonstration demanded:

* the right to be released for the approximately 160 prisoners who are
legally entitled to be released,
* the release of the 6 prisoners with serious incurable illnesses and
* the right of the prisoners to be repatriated to jails in the Basque Country

The demonstration, called by organisations from various sections of
society, which have come together under the name of the Ibaeta Forum and represent the majority of the Basque organised civil society, was aimed at supporting the prisoners' struggle for their rights, currently embodied in Iñaki de Juana's long hunger strike.

After this large demonstration, de Juana decided to give up his hunger
strike after 63 days. During this time he was force fed three times, but
now, although in a delicate condition, he is recovering at the 12 de
Octubre Hospital in Madrid.

However, on the 27th of this month, he was tried for publishing two
opinion articles in the Basque daily Gara, for which the prosecution is
requesting 96 years in prison, alleging that through these articles he
committed crimes of "issuing terrorist threats" and "membership of an
armed group". Therefore, we believe it is important to continue to follow
Iñaki's situation and especially, to maintain the pressure in view of this
trial, which is illegitimate and violates his most basic rights and in
view of the possibility of Iñaki being convicted, which would clearly be
unjust.

Here you have some reports aboat the basque prisoners's situation, and all Iñaki's letters and interviews:

The case of Iñaki de Juana is a violation of several human rights. It is
a case of arbitrary detention because of the irregular nature of the
extension of his time in prison after having served his sentence in full
and being entitled to his release; it is a flagrant violation of the right
to freedom of speech, because he is being accused of terrorism for having
published two opinion articles that had no criminal content whatsoever; it
is an example of justice working at the whim of political interests and
special jurisdictional activity; the treatment Iñaki de Juana is being
subjected to, in that he is on hunger strike of his own free will and he
is being force-fed against his will, is a clear case of inhuman and cruel
treatment. This is probably the most flagrant case today, but it is not
the only one; Iñaki de Juana's current situation is but the tip of the
iceberg.


The case of Iñaki de Juana, which has come to public notice because of his
indefinite hunger strike, is but the tip of the iceberg of the policy the
French and Spanish governments apply against the Basque Political
Prisoners' Collective.

Through the Policy of Dispersal, there is a systematic violation of the
basic rights they are entitled to as people deprived of freedom -the right
to be held in jails close to their homes, the right to healthcare, the
right to personal safety, to a legal defence, to study and use their own
language...- this policy also affects the prisoners' relatives and friends.
However, in recent times, there have been a number of changes in the law,
in jurisprudence and in court jurisdictions which have added to the
repression against this Collective, restricting their rights even further.
The latest backlash affects the right to be released of prisoners who have
finished serving their sentences and who, according to the law, should be
released.

Background: the "Parot Doctrine" and the change in jurisprudence

Article 70.2 of the 1973 Penal Code set the maximum time in prison at 30
years. This time could be reduced through remission (i.e. time deducted
from the sentence for reasons such as good behaviour, attending workshops,
studying...) Remission was calculated on that maximum serving time for
people who had received sentences above 30 years, therefore time was
discounted from those 30 years.

In 1995, the Penal Code was amended eliminating remission, due to the
increase in repression sought by the main Spanish political parties, who
advocated Basque political prisoners should serve their sentences in full.

However, prisoners convicted under the previous Penal Code still benefited
from remission, until the Spanish Supreme Court decided, in verdict
197/2006, that remission should be calculated on the total sentence passed
-in some cases, hundreds of years- and not on the maximum serving time of
30 years. In practice this cancels remission altogether. Several prisoners
will have to serve 10 or 12 years more until they complete the 30 year
limit. This new interpretation of the law which is being both
systematically and retroactively applied has become known as "Parot
Doctrine", referring to Unai Parot, the first prisoner against whom it was
applied.

Amendment of serving time: the maximum limit

In July 2003, and again in response to "the social demand against
terrorism" as explicitly stated in Organic Law 7/2003, the limit to
sentence serving time was extended to 40 years in prison; in this case, it
was specifically set for people convicted of more than two crimes of
terrorism, when one of these is punishable with more than 20 years in
jail.

With this new law, the requisites for parole were specifically amended for
cases of terrorism, expressly demanding the prisoner repudiate his or her
actions, as well as other requisites which do not apply in other
especially serious or relevant crimes -articles 90, 91 and 93 of the Penal
Code.

Denial of the right to be released

Thus, this new interpretation by the Supreme Court affects several
prisoners who were about to be released:

- Jon Agirre Agiriano, Aramaio -Araba- 25 years in prison; was to be
released on 28 October but his sentence has been extended until 3 May,
2011
- Kandido Zubikarai Badiola. Ondarroa -Bizkaia- 17 years in prison; was to
be released on 27 October but his release date has been put back 5 years.
- Koldo Hermosa Urra, Santurtzi -Bizkaia- should have been released on 8
September, but his sentence has been extended until 8 September 2017;
until he has been in prison for 30 years.
- Peio Etxeberria Lete, Soraluze -Gipuzkoa- should have been released on
10 September but his sentence has been extended until 8 April 2019.
- Iñaki Gaztañaga Bidaurreta. Arrasate -Gipuzkoa- after 18 years in
prison, he should have been released in March this year; his sentence has
been extended 12 years.
- Txomin Troitiño Arranz, Donostia -Gipuzkoa- should have been released on
18 May this year after 19 years in prison and he has been given a further
12 years, until 2017.
- Joseba Artola Ibarretxe, Bilbo, Bizkaia, after 20 years in prison, he
has been given a further 10 years, until 10 June 2016.
- Josu Bollada Alvarez, Ortuella -Bizkaia- should have been released on 20
May, his sentence has been extended until 19 September 2018.
- Antxon Lopez Ruiz, Elorrio -Bizkaia, 12 years more, until January 2017,
after 19 years in prison.
- Txerra Martinez Garcia, Basauri -Bizkaia- should have been released in
August, after 15 years in prison.
- Unai Parot. Baiona, -Lapurdi- has not finished his sentence yet.

Therefore, this dynamic affecting several prisoners and which will add up
and generate an increasingly serious situation in the future, can be
understood as pure, illegal and illegitimate revenge against people who
should be released; a revenge motivated simply and clearly by political
interests. The implications of this penitentiary treatment are
unforeseeable in the development of the political process, but we
certainly believe that using the prisoners as political hostages cannot
help the process in any way.

Iñaki de Juana Chaos on hunger strike for his right to be released

On August 7, Basque political prisoner Iñaki de Juana Chaos began a hunger
strike to demand his right to be released. Iñaki de Juana should have been
released on October 25, 2004, after serving his sentence in full and
having spent 18 years in jail. However, the Magistrate at the First Penal
Court of the Spanish Audiencia Nacional, Gómez Bermúdez, issued a decision
dated October 22, attempting to contest the remission Iñaki was entitled
to and to prevent his release.

In view of the impossibility to maintain this line of argument, the judge
decreed his remand in custody for an alleged crime of membership of an
armed group and terrorist threats.

The basis for the accusations were two opinion articles the prisoners sent
to the daily Gara. It is impossible to find any rational basis in the
articles to sustain such charges. Precisely, on June 14, 2006 the decision
whereby Audiencia Nacional judge Santiago Pedraz rejected the charges was
published. Judge Pedraz considered that, in the said articles, the
prisoner expressed his support for the Basque National Liberation Movement
-BNLM- which "is not comparable to ETA". He added that "this movement is
not defined as a terrorist organisation" and therefore the crime of
issuing terrorist threats was not proven.

At that point a media campaign was unleashed against the judge's decision.
The Minister for Justice stated "we shall build new charges so that they
are not released!" The State General Prosecutor, Cándido Conde Pumpido,
said "we shall continue to oppose his release insofar as it is legally
possible" and appealed Pedraz's decision. This climate impelled the Third
Section of the Audiencia Nacional Penal Court to rectify judge Pedraz's
decision, arguing that De Juana "boasted of and extolled" his membership
of ETA in the two articles, the content of which, according to this
decision" clearly displays a possible terrorist threat". Therefore there
was a new request for a 96 year prison sentence.

During recent times we have witnessed a brutal initiative supported by the
Spanish government and the special antiterrorist court, the Audiencia
Nacional, to prevent the release of prisoners who were entitled to
immediate release from prison, over and above all basic the principles of
law. The Spanish State, for reasons to do with a political revenge,
considers that Iñaki de Juana and other political prisoners in a similar
situation have not served enough time in jail. Therefore, the Zapatero
administration is attempting to instate this situation of de facto life
imprisonment against the Basque Political Prisoners' Collective, violating
the universal right to release of those who have served their sentences in
full. Furthermore, at this delicate political moment, when there is a
possibility to open up a resolution process for the conflict that has
confronted the Basque People and the Spanish state for years, the
executive is using the prisoners, making a democratic solution to the
political conflict more difficult.

In these circumstances, Iñaki believes he as no other way forward but to
go on an open-ended hunger strike, even if he it takes him to his death.

Hunger strike and force feeding

Iñaki de Juana was taken to hospital on September 19 due to his poor
condition on his 43rd day on hunger strike. The Audiencia Nacional agreed
to proceed to feed the political prisoner "with no use of physical force,
insofar as possible, and without violating his dignity as a human being"

Doctors from the Punta Europa Hospital in Algeciras, following the
Audiencia Nacional injunction began feeding him against his will.
According to the Penitentiary Administration, the treatment was initiated
due to a possible "risk of heart failure". Police officers tied his arms
and legs to the bed in view of his refusal to agree to be given
intravenous potassium and saline solution. He was tied to the bed for 24
hours. During the visit with his relatives, he explained how on Wednesday
his arms and legs were tied again by policemen, because he refused to
accept a certain amount of potassium be put in the saline solution. In
Iñaki's own words, his body "has never suffered such violence", after 24
hours tied down, he could not take it any longer and he asked to be
untied, saying he would not take action against the doctors.

These events opened up a debate on the legitimacy of medical intervention
in a protest of this nature. The Declaration of Malta by the World Medical
Association, dated November 1991, literally states: "Doctors or other
health care personnel may not apply undue pressure of any sort on the
hunger striker to suspend the strike. Treatment or care of the hunger
striker must not be conditional upon him suspending his hunger strike."
The UN Special Rapporteur, in a statement issued on 9/02/2006, defines
force-feeding techniques as torture. We would simply like to ratify the
right of this Basque prisoner to carry out his struggle without state
intervention -further even, with no violent intervention- when his will is
to continue with his struggle. This hunger strike seems to be the very
last resort left to Iñaki de Juana in order to protest against the
injustice he is suffering.


Appendix 1

These are the articles the Spanish Court is using as a pretext to keep
Iñaki de Juana in jail. The Prosecution says they constitute a crime of
"terrorist threats" and is asking for Iñaki to be sentenced to a further
96 years in prison.

THE SHIELD

Iñaki de Juana Chaos, Basque political prisoner
Published in Gara 1-12-2004

I watch the TV. I read newspapers and magazines and the bombardment is
intense and permanent. The enemy is feeling strong. Arrests in Iparralde
and Hegoalde [the north and the south of the Basque Country]. Raids in the
French and Spanish states. Poisonous information attempting to inoculate
the virus of mistrust.

El Lobo, a mere informer who the police emptied out before flinging him
onto the rubbish heap together with other unusable things (as usually
happens with all small-time informers), is now recovered and elevated to
the category of a hero of infiltration and the secret services; a main
character in films and documentaries where he displays cloak and dagger
bravado under the cover of scripts and cheque books.

Manoeuvres seeking discouragement. Leaking of correspondence and
conversations, totally or partially, but always manipulated, even though
one must acknowledge that we should never make their work easier.

Penitentiary dispersal: between prisons and inside the prisons. Ill
treatment, torture renewed over time but permanent in their forms and as
old as political repression itself. Attacks. Suffering for our families
and friends. Ill comrades being blackmailed with their illnesses.

Indeed, the offensive is tough, on all fronts, and undeniable. Perhaps the
enemy is thinking they can give us the coup de grâce? Are they thinking
the can finish the BNLM off? That they can break a People or, at least,
silence its steps making it walk only on carpet?

I do not need to be a fortune-teller to be able to shout, with all my
strength and conviction, using a politically rather incorrect expression:
you're in for a big surprise! Go to hell with all that, because you are
not going to win. Or have you still not realised that we have an
unbreakable shield, the shield of being in the right?

Like any totalitarian, fascist or neo-fascist power, the current PSOE
government, like its predecessor and the ones that went before, feels a
permanent need to rewrite history, to manipulate and lie, creating good
guys and bad guys according to its own interests, going even further than
the limits of the Orwellian fiction. And they do this as a war strategy
with the sole and declared aim of assimilating us, getting us to renounce
our principles, values and rights and to integrate in their system.

Corrupt judges and politicians, professional torturers, unscrupulous
prison guards; you are boring and foreseeable. You deserve no respect or
consideration, not even the minimum that could make me take care with the
tone of this letter.

However, all this deserves an explanation. Zapatero's attitude is
totalitarian? Fascist? Those blue eyes and angelical smile? The same guy
who brought the soldiers home from Iraq? The one who is going to amend the
laws on abortion, divorce and many others in order to keep a "domesticated
left" happy? Yes; there is no doubt, totalitarianism, because, taking the
Basque Country as the main priority, whoever promulgates exception laws
and creates or maintains special courts, whoever protects the use of
torture and persecutes and suppresses the right of association, to free
speech, to a free press; whoever forbids participation in politics and
elections; is a totalitarian. And whoever does all this to silence a
nation and deny it its right to self determination is a handbook fascist,
let us speak with no frills.

Technically, on 25 October, 2004, I finished serving the prison sentence I
received from their legal and penitentiary system under the 1973 Penal
Code. This was a Penal Code from Franco's days, incomparably "softer" than
the current laws. I have not been released since, officially, because
Judge Gómez Bermúdez -another meteoric star built on the suffering of
Basques- has "doubts" about my served sentence. Once again, I cannot but
be shocked -I hope I never lose the ability to be surprised- at their
disdain towards their own laws. It is natural for us who fight against
these laws to reject them; but the fact that those whose bread and butter
depend on the law scorn that very law is but another indication of their
true function.

However, in my case, the terms "illegality" or "kidnap" cannot be used,
and I do not like them to be used; because 700 comrades, some of them for
quite a bit longer than myself, and outside the walls the part of society
that refuses to conform are all kidnapped in an illegal way by an
authoritarian system. At the end of the day, there are hundreds of
thousands of Basques who are currently under a kind of "unofficial
parole", expecting any night men in uniforms might batter their door and
inform them they are being taken away for bad behaviour.

Minister López Aguilar has been much more explicit. De Juana cannot be
released under any terms and that is the end of the story. The reason? He
shows no signs of resocialisation. Nevertheless, fortunately, neither De
Juana nor the immense majority of the 700 Basque prisoners show any signs
of "resocialisation" nor does a large part of Basque society either.

Because resocialising, in the sense used by the enemy, involves defeat,
and accepting the countervalues that people like López Aguilar, Zapatero
and Gómez Bermúdez so magnificently represent. But they should ask
themselves a question: if 700 comrades with thousands of years served in
prison and thousands more yet to serve show no signs of "resocialisation",
maybe something in their "penitentiary treatment" is failing? What is
failing is that we have the shield of being in the right. And nothing is
insurmountable, nothing in personal or political terms, except acceptation
of failure.

There are ups and downs in all processes. Appearances can be deceptive.
Politically, noise does not amount to strength and silence does not mean
weakness. We are going to win. Let us read the history of other successful
processes, not the history of the defeated. Let us compare the level of
agreement with our political discourse in Basque society, now and 25 years
ago. The rest will come easily: work, sacrifice, learning from our
mistakes and not putting obstacles in our own path.

Years ago, I heard a much appreciated comrade shout "take your filthy
hands off the Basque Country". Yes, take your hands off our country,
because any other way will only bring more suffering. Otherwise, the
future will doubtless prove you lost your hands.


------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

GALLIZO

Iñaki de Juana Chaos, Basque Political Prisoner
Publisher in Gara on 30-12-2004


Last 14th December, Ms. Margarita Uria turned to the Prime Minister during
the Investigation Commission into the 11-M, to ask him, among other
things, about certain penitentiary matters. After an introduction,
praising Mercedes Gallizo in a way that would make you go red in the face,
the commissioner asked Mr. Rodríguez Zapatero, exclusively, about the
leaking of certain images and a letter to the mass media.

Ms. Margarita Uria did not ask about torture and ill treatment. She did
not ask about death and sickness of prisoners. She expressed no interest
in isolation and incommunicado detention; or in the road accidents; and
she most certainly did not ask about the policy of dispersal, perhaps
because they could have answered that Ms. Uria's own party was the main
champion of this policy. it was the PNV that legitimised repression and
the most cruel penitentiary policy, not only in terms of its theoretical
design and coverage and putting into practice, but as a main actor, with
their own advisers at the General Direction of IIPP (the Penitentiary
Administration).

Neither Ms. Margarita Uria nor any of the MPs that display the flag of
human rights as their standard for combat had the slightest temptation to
take any interest into the humiliation and sexual abuse several of the
female detainees arrested in the latest police raids suffered. Ms. Uria is
not interested in this, not as an MP, not even as a woman. And she asks no
questions about this because she knows that being arrested as an alleged
ETA member during a repression operation, with the resulting media
coverage, is enough of a reason to erase all one's rights including the
right not to be tortured. The hypocrisy of old said "it's no crime to
steal from a thief". The new leaders of our citizens say "using violence
against a victim is not double violence, it is justice and silence". But
all of us know this, including the Right Honourable Commissioner who
praises Ms. Gallizo.

Seeing all this praise from respectable people (unlike me, a red, a Basque
as well as several isms), I wondered whether I was mistaken. Be positive
Iñaki! I told myself. I imagined the concrete walls were made of
chocolate, the steel was really tinsel. I imagined the three prisoners
dead last night in Langraitz and Zuera prisons were really ginger men.
But, funnily enough, I was unable to imagine Ms. Gallizo as anything
different to what she is, to what her predecessors were.

When the PSOE won the last general election, certain expectations took
root amongst those who are prone to come up with expectations, whether due
to naivety or to necessity. These illusions, in politics, are generally
proven wrong by time. The same thing happened with Ms. Gallizo's
appointment to the head of the Penitentiary Administration. Although in
the beginning the large scale shuffling at top level in the jails could
have been seen as a prelude of meaningful changes, when I received news of
the names appointed to these posts, I was vindicated in my belief that the
only horizon of justice for prisons involves tearing down their walls.
This hope of mine, however utopian it may seem, is more realistic, less
loaded with hypocrisy, than trying or hoping for concrete and steel to
contain human rights instead of violence and suffering.

In this jail of Algeciras, Ms. Gallizo dismissed Governor Miguel Angel
Rodríguez, a.k.a. the Sword Swallower. A cultivated professional that
would instantly react upon hearing the name of a Basque political
prisoner. And he fluently wove an elaborate discourse: "Las resoluciones
judiciales de los etarras me las paso por el forro de los cojones" (I wipe
my arse with court decisions favourable to ETA prisoners). He is an old
acquaintance of the Basque political prisoners' collective who has not
been dismissed for accumulating mountains of irregular actions and court
claims. He has not even been dismissed for a little matter of, allegedly,
sticking his hand into the cash box of Puerto II Prison, for which he was
submitted to disciplinary action. He has been dismissed for not belonging
to the same political party ad Ms. Gallizo. We could not have that!

I switch the TV on. There is a piece on the Huelva Cinema Festival. Next
to actor Imanol Arias, schmoozing and pampering him, I think I recognise a
face that brings back nasty memories. His hair is white and he looks much
older, though it will not be because his conscience is nagging him. In any
case, it might be punishment for excess. I feel stupidly consoled to see
that, on this occasion, the torturer looks worse than the torture victims.
There is no doubt. We have that face burned into our memories with blows
of ill treatment and hunger. It is Francisco Sanz, vice-governor of Málaga
prison. Former Governor of Salto del Negro, Puerto II and now Governor of
Huelva Prison, where he has organised for some prisoners to give out one
of the prizes in the Cinema Festival. That is why he is drooling around
Imanol Arias, and the first thing to enter my mind upon seeing the images
is to ask myself whether the actor has noticed the mark of the truncheon
and the damp blood when they shook hands. There seems to have been no
Governor change in Huelva Prison.

The list of new appointments is long, up to 21 names, plus 10 more whose
posts have changed. Some surnames lead me to search my memory. It was
1977, I think, because the only archive I have, my brain, is not as
reliable as a hard drive. In any case, it was in the years after Franco's
death, when Basque society was brimming with hope and the political
parties were conspiring to destroy that hope. I was walking down the
street in Madrid on one of those many days when there were demonstrations
demanding amnesty and freedom. I left the Gran Vía behind me, went up
Libreros street and, beside the no longer existing Hotel Darde, I bumped
into a group of young people, like me, who were racing down and shouting
"they've opened fire!". Full of more curiosity than caution, I continued
to the end of the street. I turned right into La Estrella and, a few
metres further ahead, there was a young man, lying dead in a pool of
blood. The place filled up with Grises (Spanish policemen) and it appears
that the people who had fired the shots were Argentineans from the Triple
A. Whatever! One of those names, they were all a front for the same thing,
and they reappear whenever necessary.

The dead youth was called Arturo Ruiz. He had a brother who started out in
the left and ended up being in the PSOE and a becoming jailer. A trusted
prison guard, so much so that he would allow his office in Almería prison
to be used for small-hour secret talks between Government envoys and
representatives of a revolutionary armed organisation that is NOT ETA. One
of those negotiations that never exist, and if they do, their existence is
denied. Arturo Ruiz died on a day of protest, demanding amnesty and
freedom. His brother lives to sever freedom. And he lives well, as the new
Governor of Sevilla II Prison.

Jesús Eladio del Rey Reguillo, a.k.a. el Tirillas, appointed new Governor
of Valdemoro Prison. And the first thing that comes into my mind is the
rebellion in Wing I at Herrera de la Mancha in 1988, as a result of which
out of just over 40 political prisoners, half of us ended up in the
infirmary and five comrades ended up in hospital with bones broken. A
grotesque image of el Tirillas with a hunting knife in his hand, leading a
large group of guards and guardia civil, marching up and down the wings,
cell by cell, saying who should receive a simple or a double beating
session.

Manuel Martínez Cano, a.k.a. el Morritos, appointed new Governor of Jaén
Prison. The person who provoked and caused the above rebellion and the
only agreeable memory of whom any prisoner may have was seeing him
cowering and covered in white powder from a fire-extinguisher one of our
comrades brandished during that rebellion.

Antonio Diego Martin, appointed Governor of Puerto II prison and
investigated for torture and unnecessary severity in Sevilla II prison.
Tried together with the former General Director of the Penitentiary
Administration, Antonio Asunción, he was never disqualified from his
repression work and he has carried on right up to now, in Melilla prison.
Prisoners handcuffed to their beds for weeks; the torture sessions, naked
and sprayed with water, the moans and screams; they never merited a single
day of disqualification from his post. Quite to the contrary, they now
make him worthy of promotion by Ms. Gallizo.

Why continue with the list? I have convinced myself. The new penitentiary
policy of Mr. Rodríguez Zapatero's new government is about recovering or
promoting the characters that prisoners in general and the Basque
political prisoners' collective most sadly remember. Or to keep those who
already fulfil these requisites in their posts.

The expectations have been fulfilled. Or maybe I am wrong and torturers
can actually fight against torture. They are certainly not lacking in
experience. Then, even I would be capable of imagining Ms. Gallizo as
something different to what she is.

Appendix 2
Iñaki de Juana's own opinion, published in the press


Letter sent to Berria newspaper by Iñaki de Juana Chaos from Algeciras
prison, published by the newspaper on 17 September, 2006. Original in
Basque.

"The reasons for my protest"

Thank you all very much. Today, September 11, 2006, on the 35th day of my
hunger strike, the expressions of solidarity I am receiving keep
surprising me and moving me.

I know only a part of these is directly because of me.

It could not be any other way: the demonstrations of solidarity we are
receiving, partly because of my situation, are for all Basque prisoners,
for all of us suffering repression because of our ideas.

Solidarity, yes: against the refusal to budge of those who deny the Basque
Country its right to decide; against those who have reinvented opinion
crimes; against those who apply a custom-made Criminal Law, typical of
fascist regimes (which would disgust even first-year law students);
against those who set out two kinds of law: one for enemies and political
dissidents, and another one for their friends, the corrupt, the "galgos",
for neo-Nazis, financiers, torturers and privileged subjects of their
reasons of State.

Some friends have been longer than me behind bars. Others have cancer or
other illnesses, as an added punishment. Many others are suffering the
legal aberration known as the "Parot Doctrine". I would like to send all
of them a big hug: I know that these demonstrations of solidarity are for
them and that this solidarity will stand as long as there is one single
political prisoner inside these walls of steel and concrete.

There are four reasons that have led me to the tough decision of going on
an indefinite hunger strike:

First: I am truly convinced that what they are doing to me and, while they
are at it, the jurisprudence they will base on this case, as has happened
before, will have consequences for freedom of speech and political
dissidence as well as for myself.

Second: I am sure that with this decision I am not harming anyone. Quite
to the contrary, if there are any beneficial consequences, these will
affect everyone. If the consequences are negative, thy will only affect
me.

Third: the urgent need to stand up, rebel and fight against such terrible
injustice. It is not possible to remain indifferent or resigned (I do not
even know which of these two is worse). Over the last twenty years I have
been a puppet for the media; they have beaten me, insulted me and
destroyed me. They have sought to brainwash people, overtly and covertly,
about my personal, academic and political situation. I have suffered and
continue to suffer all kinds of insults. A hunger strike is the only way
left to me to symbolically thump the table with my fist and say "enough is
enough".

Fourth: very simply, I should have been released on October 24, 2004. Over
the last two years, manipulation of prison reports, covering up or voiding
of final judiciary decisions, the creation of other obstacles... all these
elements have been used to make the chain of "anything goes", the heavy
chain to prevent my release, as many political and judiciary leaders have
stated. In the end, we enter the theatre of the grotesque: they want to
punish me with 96 years in jail for two opinion articles, when the
investigation judge found no evidence of a crime in their content. I
demand to be released.

These four reasons to begin the hunger strike are easy to understand and
the wave of solidarity is proof of this. The reasons have no other
intentions; they cannot be interpreted any other way.

I would like to thank everyone with my little contribution to the
historical struggle of political prisoners for our rights. I am also
making this promise: I will respond to what the situation demands, I shall
not fail so many people standing in solidarity, I will give it all I have.

Gora Euskal Herria askatua! Gora Euskal Herria sozialista!

Long live a free Basque Country, long live a socialist Basque Country!

Algeciras, 11 September, 2006.



Gara 22-09-2006

INTERVIEW: Iñaki de Juana, Basque political prisoner, in Algeciras Hospital
"Every measure they have taken is against my will"

"The medical vice-director of the prison told me he would not allow me to
be on hunger strike for more than 50 days"

Iñaki de Juana was admitted to Algeciras hospital on Tuesday and he is
being intravenously force-fed since Wednesday. GARA is publishing an
exclusive interview, dated September 14 in Algeciras jail, when the
Donostia-born prisoner had spent 38 days with no food. In the interview,
De Juana states that all the measures the medical teams have taken towards
him "and the measures yet to come" are against his will.

"I don't think they will take much longer". This was what Iñaki de Juana
said last week about the possibility of being force-fed "against my will
and by force". In this interview, the prisoner goes over his situation and
the situation of the Basque Political Prisoners' Collective, highlighting
the idea that there is a Spanish State political strategy being this
situation.

On August 7 you began an indefinite hunger strike. Which were the main
reasons that led you to this?

There are four reasons: I am convinced that the jurisprudence created in
my case will affect all political prisoners and freedom of speech too, not
just me; I am sure that I am not harming anyone and that any positive
consequences will be for everyone and negative consequences will only
affect me; the need to sat "enough is enough" in the face of so many
attacks; and the need to demand my release after having finished serving
my sentence two years ago.

Instead of choosing another form of struggle, you chose the toughest form
of protest...

The forms of struggle available to a prisoner are very limited: lock-ups,
refusal to do certain things, hunger strikes and some other purely
symbolic things. Unfortunately, and despite the fact this is also subject
to many limits, the only thing that can be taken seriously as a protest
and may serve as a form of pressure is to place your life in the hands of
the Administration. And this is also the form of struggle best understood
outside, precisely because of its toughness.

You have had no food for over a month, how has this time passed?

Very quickly, because of the tremendous motivation I have. I feel very
strong and positive. Physically, I feel the normal wear, but
psychologically I am even more determined than when I made the decision.

The Audiencia Nacional ordered you to be taken to a hospital for various
tests and they also ordered you to be force fed, even against your will.
What is your opinion on this?

To date, September 14, they took me out to hospital on the first two
weeks, to carry out electrocardiograms and various tests; I refuse to do
this voluntarily so as not to cooperate with a medical team made up of the
very same people who are prepared to act against my will and using force.
After those two weeks, they are carrying out the tests inside the prison,
always under the coverage of the Audiencia Nacional decision.

The AN has issued two decisions up to now: one from the Central
Penitentiary Court and another one from the First Section of the Penal
Court. Both say I can be taken to hospital whenever they want and they can
do all kinds of tests.

They have not issued the order to force-feed me yet, but they have said
they will and I don't think they will take much longer, because even the
medical vice-director of the prison told me he would not allow me to be on
hunger strike for more than 50 days without them force-feeding me.

Both the measures they have taken up to now and the ones still to come are
unjustly violating my will, regardless of how much constitutional backing
they have. It is not only psychological torture, in that it violates my
will, but also physical, violating my body, because they do it through
physical force. In addition, these measures lengthen your suffering, but
they do not guarantee you will live, nor do they guarantee you will have a
healthy life in decent conditions.

One of the court decisions used your medical precedent of "kidney failure"
as justification...

In the early 90s, in Salto del Negro jail, there were a number of very
tough struggles. During 1992, I took part in three long hunger strikes.
Other comrades, Esteban, Tapia, Garratz... did more than I, before and after
I was there.

During the third and last hunger strike I took part in, after
forty-something days I had a bad case of kidney failure. They forcefully
intubated me and urgently got me out of the prison. I must have been in
bad condition because there was a doctor with me all the way on the ship
and then in the ambulance, all the way to the Málaga Prison Infirmary,
where they held me for a month and a half until I recovered.

As you know, when the kidneys stop, the damage is definitive, but mine did
not get that bad. The damage was reversible and I recovered completely.
Fourteen years later, the Penitentiary Administration has shaken the dust
off this old situation and included it in the medical history it has sent
to the Audiencia Nacional to justify these hurried measures. That is why
the court decision makes that reference.

However, I want to make it clear that at the time of beginning the hunger
strike my health was perfect, I had no illnesses whatsoever.

You have expressed total determination to carry on with the hunger strike,
what makes your decision be so firm?

It is the only weapon I have. I do not know what will happen in this
situation. It will depend on several factors. But I am certain that the
alternative is life imprisonment and dying of old age in prison. I choose
to fight, and we will see what happens. In any case, fighting in itself is
winning. But I do not want my decision to be seen as a desperate measure;
that it is not. It is a struggle.

Since you began your protest many protests have taken place in the
street. What is the value of these gestures of solidarity? Do you feel
the warmth from the street?

Yes, it gets in here and I can feel it. These actions are extremely
important for my morale and for the possible, though difficult, resolution
of this situation. I am immensely grateful. But I am also conscious that
only a small part of this is because of me, and so it should be.
Solidarity is for all the political prisoners and for all those who suffer
reprisals because of their political ideas. Of course, mine is one of the
most striking situations, although all of them are a scandal. And at this
point in time it seems this has been cathartic in the midst of the
sickness about the lack of movement and all the attacks.

Attacks against the Basque Political prisoners' Collective and their
living conditions have come in quick succession; what is your reading of
the situation and what is your assessment of the Collective as a whole?

I am not the person to ask about the Collective as a whole. The only ones
who can and must answer that are the comrades officially appointed
representatives of all the Basque political prisoners. Plus, honestly, it
would be unfair for me to answer this because, strange as it may seem, I
do not know. I mean that after the policy of dispersal began, I have
almost always been held in isolation wings, with very few comrades, so I
only know what a few of us think.

Personally, I think that for years, especially the last three years, the
State has been filling the bag with hostages; in order to let them go
later on, if needs be, little by little. And to draw out any possible
resolution process over the years, keeping up the blackmail. To sell the
dismantling of the previously taken increases in repression as if this was
a gesture of generosity and after a number of years, to arrive at the same
situation we were in fifteen years ago.

However, and I am not talking in anyone's name, what I do know, as any
observer should, is that the Collective has resisted every kind of attack
for almost thirty years, and we will continue to resist.

In your case, they have used two opinion articles in order to request a
new sentence of 96 years in jail...

But the first argument they used not to release me was because they voided
definitive judicial decisions about my remission due to studies. When they
could no longer use this because it was even causing contradictions among
the judges and they still had not come up with the "Parot Doctrine", they
came up with the thing about the articles. Anything goes to keep the
hostage bag full. Don't let anyone out; or, at least, don't let anyone
they don't want out.

Lately, Basque political and institutional leaders have made statements
asking for the prisoners to be repatriated, or, at least, for them to be
moved closer to their homes. What is your assessment of these statements?

They are a firework display. Pure hypocrisy. Because these are nothing but
statements, the deeds do not match the words. They implement no measures
to give credibility to their words. Plus, you must not forget that all
those leaders are collaborators in dispersal, the suffering, the deaths,
inside prison and also relatives and friends, the road accidents, the
economic burden...

The only ones who have always been on the side of the prisoners are the
Basque independence movement, and we must not forget this or be distracted
with talk and hot air. What is happening is that, with their attitude and
lack of dignity, yet again, all those politicians are looking to make
political profit from the possible future repatriation of the prisoners.

Do you have any hope that popular pressure will achieve anything for the
Collective?

Personally, I expect nothing but repression from the Spanish leaders. I
expect nothing from Basque and false-Navarrese collaborationists. As
always, the independence movement will have to face the problems and solve
them on its own, with its own strength. As always, through struggle and
sacrifice. Struggling and rebelling means not allowing ourselves to be
assimilated. It means resistance. And, in the long run, it means victory.