Although the reference date regarding the end of ETA’s violence is October 20, 2011, when it announced the “definitive cessation of armed activity”, its dissolution came with a statement made public five years ago now. The lehendakari, Iñigo Urkullu, wanted to remember this date to send a message on which he repeatedly insists: recognition of the “unfair damage” caused by the terrorist organization is “essential”. A message that challenges EH Bildu, and especially Sortu, and that for the moment has not been attended to by the Abertzale coalition.
Urkullu made this reflection during his speech at the 60th anniversary of the Eldu company, held at the Euskalduna Palace in Bilbao.
Five years after José Antonio Urrutikoetxea, Josu Ternera, and Soledad Iparragirre, alias Anboto, read the statement announcing the band’s dissolution -an announcement that came almost seven years after the end of the violence-, Urkullu He has indicated that his legacy has been “thousands of people victims of his persecution, extortion, blackmail, pain and death.” “His legacy from him is a suffering society, a coexistence in need of restoration,” he said.
The lehendakari has pointed out that the memory of the Basque Government is with the victims today, and added that his demand focuses on the “necessary recognition of the unjust pain caused”, which has to be “sincere and honest” to “contribute to coexistence and that something like this will never happen again.”
In his opinion, “recognition towards people, towards companies, towards Basque society is also due, which, despite this, has made the Basque Country what we are today”.
Iñigo Urkullu has assured that the responsibility is “to learn well what has been lived”, and has added that they want to build a future “based on peace and coexistence”. Therefore, he believes that it would be an “essential contribution” on a day like today “to recognize all the unfair damage caused.”
In this way, the lehendakari insists on his ethical demands regarding EH Bildu and, in particular, Sortu, the party he has been questioning in this regard and with whom he maintains a particularly distant relationship, especially with regard to his position regarding ETA violence.
In his more than 10 years in office, the lehendakari has been characterized by an approach to the groups of victims of ETA and by the aforementioned ethical demand to the world of the nationalist left, although with his own agenda in terms of peace and coexistence, channeled through a vice-ministry of Human Rights, Memory and Cooperation.
