It engaged in a campaign of bombings, assassinations, and kidnappings throughout Spain and especially the Southern Basque Country against the regime, which was highly centralised and hostile to the expression of non-Castilian minority identities.

The eleven different substructures were: logistics, politics, international relations with fraternal organisations, military operations, reserves, prisoner support, expropriation, information, recruitment, negotiation, and treasury.

Formerly known as Euskal Herritarrok and "Herri Batasuna", it was banned by the Spanish Supreme Court as an anti-democratic organisation following the Political Parties Law (Ley de Partidos Políticos[42]).

[50] Many within the Basque nationalistic movement strongly disputed the Law, which they considered too draconian or even unconstitutional; alleging that any party could be made illegal almost by choice, simply for not clearly stating their opposition to an attack.

[53] The Spanish transition to democracy from 1975 on and ETA's progressive radicalisation had resulted in a steady loss of support, which became especially apparent at the time of their 1997 kidnapping and countdown assassination of Miguel Ángel Blanco.

[55] There were also concerns that Spain's "judicial offensive" against alleged ETA supporters (two Basque political parties and one NGO were banned in September 2008) constituted a threat to human rights[citation needed].

[66] Subsequently, Marxist and third-worldist perspectives developed within ETA, becoming the basis for a political programme set out in Federico Krutwig's (an anarchist of German origin) 1963 book Vasconia, which is considered to be the defining text of the movement.

[73] A more recent study by the Memorial de Víctimas del Terrorismo based on the analysis of police diligences at the time reached the same conclusion, naming Guillermo Santoro, member of DRIL, as the author of the attack.

[75] This led to retaliation in the form of the first planned ETA assassination: that of Melitón Manzanas, chief of the secret police in San Sebastián and associated with a long record of tortures inflicted on detainees in his custody.

However, the last use of capital punishment in Spain when two ETA members were executed in September 1975, eight weeks before Franco's death, sparked massive domestic and international protests against the Spanish government.

ETA VII accepted this partial amnesty granted by the now democratic Spanish government and integrated into the political party Euskadiko Ezkerra ("Left of the Basque Country").

The group's connections with the state were unveiled by the Spanish journal El Mundo, with an investigative series leading to the GAL plot being discovered and a national trial initiated.

Premier Felipe González was quoted as saying that the constitutional state has to defend itself "even in the sewers" (El Estado de derecho también se defiende en las cloacas), something which, for some, indicated at least his knowledge of the scheme.

These events marked the end of the armed "counter-terrorist" period in Spain and no major cases of foul play on the part of the Spanish government after 1987 (when GAL ceased to operate) have been proven in courts.

[91] Unai Romano's case was very controversial: pictures of him with a symmetrically swollen face of uncertain aetiology were published after his incommunicado period leading to claims of police abuse and torture.

Martxelo Otamendi, the ex-director of the Basque newspaper Euskaldunon Egunkaria, decided to bring charges in September 2008 against the Spanish Government in the European Court of Human Rights for "not inspecting properly" cases tainted by torture.

[needs update] As a result of ETA's violence, threats and killings of journalists, Reporters Without Borders included Spain in all six editions of its annual watchlist on press freedom up to 2006.

Yoyes was a former member of ETA who had abandoned the armed struggle and rejoined civil society: they accused her of "desertion" because of her taking advantage of the Spanish reinsertion policy which granted amnesty to those prisoners who publicly renounced political violence (see below).

[citation needed] Another Spanish "counter-terrorist" law puts suspected terrorist cases under the central tribunal Audiencia Nacional in Madrid, due to the threats by the group over the Basque courts.

[citation needed] The appearance of these groups was attributed by many to the supposed weakness of ETA, which obliged them to resort to minors to maintain or augment their impact on society after arrests of leading militants, including the "cupola".

On 24 December 2003, in San Sebastián and in Hernani, National Police arrested two ETA members who had left dynamite in a railroad car prepared to explode in Chamartín Station in Madrid.

On 22 March 2006, ETA sent a DVD message to the Basque Network Euskal Irrati-Telebista[103] and the journals Gara[104] and Berria with a communiqué from the group announcing what it called a "permanent ceasefire" that was broadcast over Spanish TV.

[citation needed] In April 2009 Jurdan Martitegi was arrested, making him the fourth consecutive ETA military chief to be captured within a single year, an unprecedented police record, further weakening the group.

[112] The central prosecutor in the French town of Bayonne, Anne Kayanakis, announced, as the official version, that the autopsy carried out on the body of Jon Anza – a suspected member of the armed Basque group ETA, missing since April 2009 – revealed no signs of having been beaten, wounded or shot, which should rule out any suspicions that he died from unnatural causes.

[116][117][118] On 21 October 2011, ETA announced a cessation of armed activity via video clip sent to media outlets following the Donostia-San Sebastián International Peace Conference, which was attended by former UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan, former Taoiseach of Ireland Bertie Ahern, former prime minister of Norway Gro Harlem Brundtland (an international leader in sustainable development and public health), former Interior Minister of France Pierre Joxe, president of Sinn Féin Gerry Adams (a Teachta Dála in Dáil Éireann), and British diplomat Jonathan Powell, who served as the first Downing Street Chief of Staff.

[121] The day after the ceasefire, in a contribution piece to The New York Times, Tony Blair indicated that lessons in dealing with paramilitary separatist groups can be learned from how the Spanish administration handled ETA.

[8] Actions in France usually consisted of assaults on arsenals or military industries to steal weapons or explosives; these were usually stored in large quantities in hide-outs located in the French Basque Country rather than Spain.

Other groups typically considered to belong to this independentist movement are the political party Batasuna, the nationalist youth organization Segi, the labour union Langile Abertzaleen Batzordeak (LAB), and Askatasuna among others.

[165] The law resulted in the banning of Herri Batasuna and its successor parties unless they explicitly condemned terrorist actions and, at times, imprisoning or trying some of its leaders who have been indicted for cooperation with ETA.

Judicial procedure 18/98 has many ramifications, including the following: In 2007, indicted members of the youth movements Haika, Segi and Jarrai were found guilty of a crime of connivance with terrorism.