Posted on 03/11/2004 9:52:55 PM PST by Destro
Posted on Thu, Mar. 11, 2004
Report: at least one ETA member was thought to have joined al-Qaida in recent years
Series of terrorist blasts kills more than 190 in Spain
BY MATTHEW SCHOFIELD
Knight Ridder Newspapers
MADRID, Spain - (KRT) - More than 190 people were killed and at least another 1,200 injured when a series of terrorist bombs ripped through trains during the Spanish capital's morning rush hour Thursday. It was the bloodiest such attack in Spain's history.
Government officials quickly blamed the bombings, three days before national elections, on the Basque separatist group ETA, which has waged a bloody 40-year campaign for independence. A letter to an Arabic-language newspaper in London later claimed the attacks were carried out by the al-Qaida terrorist network, but provided no evidence.
The letter, which dubbed the explosions "Operation Death Trains," called the attacks "a way to settle old accounts with Spain, crusader and ally of America in its war against Islam."
The letter, delivered to the Al Quds Al Arabi newspaper, was signed by the Abu Hafs al Masri Brigades, the same group that claimed responsibility last year for the November bombings of two synagogues in Turkey and the August bombing of a Marriott hotel in Indonesia. The group, which is linked to al-Qaida, has falsely claimed responsibility for other attacks, however, and some intelligence officials think it exists in name only.
Late Thursday, Spanish police reported finding a van with seven detonators, an Arabic tape and Quranic writing, and were investigating whether it was linked to the attacks.
"This pain will never leave Madrid," Mayor Alberto Ruiz Gallardon said.
The bombs were carried onto the trains in satchels, and were believed to have been made from dynamite and explosives stolen from France three years ago.
Police said 10 bombs rocked the trains. Another three were detected and safely detonated by police.
The explosions struck the trains within minutes of one another, just as commuters - workers and students - were preparing to pile off the trains along the southern side of the city. Hardest hit was Atocha, the city's main station.
Witnesses described scenes of confusion and carnage, with severed arms and legs strewn across blood-drenched platforms and bombed-out rail cars. Several trains were torn apart by multiple blasts.
The number of dead and wounded was overwhelming. Doctors and emergency workers performed rail-side surgery, city buses were pressed into service as ambulances and makeshift morgues were set up.
Police blocked access to the stations, but even from a distance scores of bodies and bleeding victims could be seen on the graveled ground.
Police urged residents not to drive, in hopes of saving lives by speeding ambulances to hospitals.
The confusion spread far beyond the stations. Throughout Madrid, people sat on sidewalks, weeping. Strangers hugged one another at intersections. Many business owners spent the day not knowing whether missing workers had been caught by the blasts.
At one of the hospitals, a nurse captured the horror of the day, noting, "The cell phones of the dead keep ringing."
King Juan Carlos and Queen Sophia visited hospital after hospital. "Whoever did this are vile, cowardly murderers," the king said in an address to the nation.
ETA remained the principal suspect throughout the day, but even officials who fingered the group, which has planted more than 800 explosives in its efforts to end Spanish rule over four mountainous provinces near the border with France, acknowledged that the bombings bore little resemblance to previous ETA attacks.
ETA usually provides a warning before an attack, aims at government targets and kills far fewer people. The group's most violent year to date claimed 118 deaths, and its biggest bombing killed 21.
ETA is also known for claiming responsibility for its violence, but Arnaldo Ptegi, the leader of Batasuna, ETA's banned political arm, issued a statement decrying the attacks and other ETA supporters said the attacks carried the fingerprints of the "Arabic resistance."
Spanish officials had noted stepped-up activity recently by what they believed were ETA operatives. On Christmas Eve, two men thought to be ETA members were arrested trying to get on trains in Madrid with suitcases full of dynamite.
Intelligence officials in Washington noted that the explosives used in Thursday's bombings appear to be a match for those found Feb. 29 in a van that was seized in Spain's Cuenca province. The van was carrying 1,182 pounds of explosives, including 66 pounds of dynamite and more than 1,100 pounds of chloratite, a commercial explosive.
The van and a car traveling with it were headed from France toward Madrid, and both drivers were suspected ETA members.
Spain's interior minister was quoted on the Web site of the newspaper El Pais as saying officials also are investigating the possibility of al-Qaida's involvement.
The letter to Al Quds, the London paper, made pointed reference to Spanish Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar, who is retiring from public life after Sunday's balloting, El Pais reported: "Aznar, where is America now? Who will protect you from us: the United Kingdom, Japan, Italy?"
Across the country, citizens were planning massive anti-terrorism and anti-ETA marches for Friday.
Aznar, in a speech to the nation, called for three days of mourning, and political parties said they wouldn't campaign again before Sunday's election.
Aznar pledged to crush whoever placed the bombs. "There is no possible negotiation with these killers," he said.
The attack comes at a time of transition in Spain. Aznar's decision to leave public life after eight years as prime minister has created a wide-open battleground between his conservative Populist Party and the liberal Socialist Party.
Aznar is thought to have all but eliminated ETA during his tenure. More than 600 ETA members have been arrested, and some experts suggested Thursday that only a couple of dozen ETA members remain. Experts throughout Europe speculated that Thursday's attacks were a last desperate attempt by ETA to make a statement and to throw the election into further turmoil.
Some also noted that at least one ETA member was thought to have joined al-Qaida in recent years.
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(Knight Ridder Newspapers correspondents Anastasia Ustinova and Frank Davies contributed to this report from Washington.)
Can you imagine? How very, very sad.
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