Polvere da sparo

19/04/2009 WIRE: Undated handout shows Jurdan Martitegi, suspected to be the top military leader of the armed Basque separatist organisation ETA. Security forces in France on April 18, 2009, arrested Martitegi, Spanish national radio said. It said he was detained along with two other ETA suspects near the southwestern city of Perpignan in an operation carried out in cooperation with Spanish security forces. The French interior ministry said three ETA suspects were arrested in Montauriol, southwestern France, but it did not identify them. The Europa Press news agency said Martitegi confessed his identity to the arresting officers, who also seized guns and a car. He is believed to have replaced Aitzol Iriondo, who was arrested in southwestern France on December 8, as the leader of ETA’s military operations. ETA, considered a terrorist organisation by the European Union and the United States, is blamed for the deaths of 825 people in its 40-year campaign of bombings and shootings to carve a Basque homeland out of parts of northern Spain and southwestern France. AFP PHOTO / HANDOUT Pic. Afp