25-05-2007, 11:33:43
Spain Terror Trial Dwells on What Didn't Happen:
Quote:MADRID (Reuters) - Finding out what happened in Madrid's 2004 train bombings is not what interests many Spaniards following Europe's biggest terrorism trial -- it's discovering what didn't happen.
Both inside and outside the court, the theory that Basque separatists were linked to the attacks, which killed 191 people, is argued over and analyzed in forensic detail.
To the annoyance of the presiding judge and often the visible amusement of the 29 mainly Arab suspects, lawyers for victims relentlessly pursue the ETA hypothesis.
Investigators in Spain, elsewhere in Europe and in the United States blame the 10 near-simultaneous bombings of four commuter trains on Islamists inspired by al Qaeda.
This has not stopped the victims' lawyers, backed by several conservative media outlets, instigating hours of exchanges which are baffling to foreign observers who do not grasp the trial's reflected significance in Spanish domestic politics.
The former conservative government was swept from office in an election just three days after the March 11, 2004, attacks after it had pointed the finger of blame at ETA.
Now in opposition, the conservative Popular Party no longer explicitly supports the ETA theory although its highest officials are often seen close to people who do.
But the ramifications rumble on and the search for any justification for its hypothesis is as keen as ever.
In a typical episode in the trial this week, a lawyer for the Association of Victims of Terrorism repeatedly interrogated police experts about ETA involvement, eliciting a series of responses that could all be summed up by the word ``no.''
``There is not a single objective fact to connect ETA to March 11,'' said one of the experts.
MEDIA CONCENTRATES ON POINT SCORING
The media coverage of the trial, which began in February and still has weeks to run, can be puzzling to anyone expecting details of al Qaeda's operations in Spain.
Instead, newspapers often concentrate on political point-scoring.
El Pais, which supports the governing Socialists, gloated on its front page over the latest testimony by the police experts.
``The victims association's obsession with linking ETA to March 11 collides with the facts once more,'' it said.
At the other end of the political spectrum, right-wing El Mundo was fuming. ``All that was proven yesterday was that any possible police investigation into ETA has been blocked.''
Despite the lack of evidence, almost one in five Spaniards suspect ETA involvement in the attack, according to an opinion poll earlier this year. Conspiracy theories are endlessly discussed or debunked on blogs following the trial.
Both government and conservatives agree on one thing: suspicions and ill-feeling provoked by the trial are raising political tensions already simmering due to the government's failed attempt to negotiate peace with ETA last year.
Such is the anger felt by many Spaniards about the peace moves that former Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar, who left office after the 2004 electoral defeat, even suggested his socialist successor, Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, was leading the country towards a repeat of its 1930s civil war.
``Zapatero has managed to get half of Spain rejecting the other half. That's what led is to the worst episode in our history 70 years ago,'' Aznar said this week.