On Basque Country

In connection with the report of Jim Read in The Jakarta Post of Sunday, March 20 Spain's 'Aceh' boasts many gems, I appreciated a report about the Basque Country since I am from Bilbao, but there are important mistakes in the report that I would like to clarify.

To describe ETA as "a Basque nationalist group" is a terrible mistake on the part of the reporter because ETA is a terrorist group and has been declared as such by the Basque government, the Spanish government, the European Parliament and even the United Nations.

ETA has killed 90 percent of the over 1,000 Spanish civilians after Franco's death in 1975 that means after Spain became a democracy, the Basque Country had its own government, own parliament and own local constitution, the Estatuto Vasco, for the first time in history. There was and is no reason for the existence of ETA when today any political idea including the independence of the Basque Country can be discussed in the Basque Parliament.

To even write " ... many in Spain would argue that time has eroded much of the validity of ETA's cause," guides the reader to wrong ideas. The sentence is written in a way that means many in Spain support ETA. One hundred percent of all political parties in the Spanish Parliament, and all the real Basque democratic nationalist parties are against ETA and have requested ETA to stop the violence under the slogan Basta Ya, which means "Stop".

Only Batasuna, ETA's political party, does not criticize ETA violence but most Batusuna supporters are against the use of violence by ETA.

During all these years and until now ETA is sending thousands of death threats to Basque people and if they don't pay the so- called Impuesto Revolucionario -- "Tax for the Revolution", they can be killed, kidnapped, or bombs placed in their factories.

It is stated that "Guernika-Luno have been since the Middle Ages the center of the Basque regional assembly". It is not correct in Guernika-Luno are and have been the Juntas de Guernika assembly only for Bizkaia county and not for the other two counties Gipuzkoa and Alava.

It's stated that "Alava where one of Spain's most famous wines, Rioja is produced." The "Riojas" can only be produced in "La Rioja", a land with its own government and parliament and the only wines that can have the label of "Rioja ". At least later on in your report you describe its wines correctly as "Rioja Alavesa" wines.

JOSE A. DELGADO Jakarta

Note: Thank you for your explanation

--Editor