More
fudge needed to get
peace in Spain's Basque country
By
Jonathan
Power
TFF Associate
since 1991
Comments to JonatPower@aol.com
June 8, 2005
LONDON - What the peace negotiators
of Northern Ireland have taught the world with its
plethora of ethnic conflicts- albeit many less than a
decade ago- is the power of ambiguity. But can ambiguity
live forever? Northern Ireland is working out an answer
to that question still, eleven years since the ceasefire
of the Irish Republican Army in August, 1994, and seven
years since the momentous Good Friday peace agreement.
Maybe not, but it appears it can live long enough to
change the culture of violence.
Spain now confronts the same
question with the Basque struggle for independence. As
Saturday's mass march organized by the Association of the
Victims of Terrorism in Madrid reminded us passions on
both side of the fence run very high.
The relatively new socialist
government of José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero
has broken the long-standing logjam of Spanish politics
by announcing that it is prepared to talk to ETA, the
armed wing of the Basque political movement, Batasuna, as
long as ETA renounces violence. But that on its own, it
is becoming clear, won't be enough to bring ETA to the
table. ETA wants to hear that Madrid recognizes that the
destiny of the Basque country is first and foremost in
its own people's hands.
Historians recall that the story of
Northern Ireland began with a fudge- when in 1921 the
Irish prime minister, Eamonn de Valera, went along with
the creation of Northern Ireland, convincing himself and
the Irish electorate that the border would be temporary.
Until the IRA was reborn in the 1960s that did keep the
peace.
Real peace finally came to Northern
Ireland over the last decade with a number of new fudges,
the parties lying to each other and to themselves. It is
what one observer has called "a working
misunderstanding". It successfully created a non-violent
political environment that enabled each side to believe
it can fulfill its political agenda by peaceful means,
though we outsiders could and can see that the agendas
are in fact irreconcilable.
Northern Ireland, having made
astonishing progress towards the development of common
institutions of governance, now seems to have finally
gone as far as fudge can take it. Further political
progress is badly stalled, but the guns remain quiet. The
initial demand that the IRA destroy their weapons caches
was finessed with the words "put beyond use". It was only
a matter of time before the fundamentalist, fire brand,
Ian Paisley, having replaced the Nobel prize winning
leader, David Trimble, an author of the peace agreements,
as the electorate's choice to carry the Protestant
banner, called the IRA's bluff on this. What is
remarkable, despite this seismic shift on the political
front, is that the mass of the populace is self-policing
the ceasefire. Very few on either side are prepared to
allow their hardliners to go back to the day when the
gunmen set the pace. Peace- and the center- still hold.
The fudge has done, and for now is continuing to do, its
good work.
Can Spain repeat this success? It
has much going for it. Its basic problems are less severe
than Northern Ireland. There is no religious divide. The
region is prosperous. The regional government led by Juan
José Ibarretxe, a Basque nationalist, controls the
police. Many items on the Basque agenda seem reasonable-
after all Scotland has long had its own judiciary and
more recently, as I have just discovered, is quietly
opening its own diplomatic missions in places like China.
The roof hasn't fallen in on Britain and why should it on
Spain?
But Madrid must realize that there
is one step it has to take, one that will certainly cause
Zapatero a full frontal assault from his opponents in the
conservative Popular Party who still rankle from their
unexpected defeat in last year's elections.
This crucial step is to repeat what
Britain did in Northern Ireland when London publicly
recognized the Irish people's right to determine their
own future. It was this that brought the IRA to the
negotiating table, and it is clear that ETA/Batasuna are
holding out for a similar form of words.
Spaniards on both sides of the
political spectrum say they will never concede this. But
in truth it would just be one more useful fudge. As the
recent regional elections for the Basque country made
clear the militant Basque cause is declining in
intensity. Indeed, Zapatero should be prepared eventually
to go even further and say that he finds no problem about
Ibarretxe's desire to hold a referendum on
self-determination. Despite all the posturing and all the
rhetoric the fact is the militants could never
convincingly win a referendum
Copyright © 2005 By
JONATHAN POWER
I can be reached by
phone +44 7785 351172 and e-mail: JonatPower@aol.com
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