- Arturo ‘Beñat’ Villanueva
- Targeting Youth
- Repression Continues
- Charges

Arturo ‘Beñat’ Villanueva

From a young age Beñat has been involved in social, cultural, student and youth political work in the Basque Country. He was a well-known student’s union representative while studying law in the Public University of Navarre in the 1990s. During this time he worked full-time for the nationalist students’ organisation Ikasle Abertzaleak, organising for youth and student rights.

Beñat’s arrest warrant calls for his extradition to Spain based on his alleged membership of pro-independence socialist youth organisation Jarrai from 1994-2000.  During the time of his alleged membership, Jarrai was a legal organisation – the Spanish authorities are applying the law that criminalised Jarrai retrospectively.

Targeting Youth

Basque pro-independence youth activists faced continuous harassment and repression by the Spanish government and police for their political activism, which has intensified in recent years. In one example of such harassment, Beñat was arrested with more than a hundred other students during a peaceful sit-in at the university campus protesting for the right to study their degrees in Euskara (the Basque language).

The Basque youth movement was gathering strength and established a new national youth organisation, Haika, in 2000, with more than 20,000 young people attending the group’s inaugural meeting in Kanbo. Haika set about organising several thousand young activists in campaigns around social and economic issues, for youth and students’ rights and for Basque cultural rights. Fearing the political impact of a well-organised national Basque youth movement in favour of independence, the Spanish authorities, led by Judge Baltasar Garzón, responded by stepping up its campaign of criminalisation against Jarrai and Haika.

Imprisoning activists

In March 2001 Beñat was arrested by the Spanish police with another 15 young Basque pro-independence activists. After being detained incommunicado for five days, Beñat was imprisoned in Madrid. He was accused of being a member of the Basque pro-independence socialist youth organisations Jarrai and Haika.

In the year leading up to this move, there had been a huge campaign orchestrated by the Spanish government and media, falsely claiming that links existed between ETA and the youth organisations, and urging their criminalisation. As well as claiming that Jarrai-Haika was a “bridge” to ETA, Judge Garzón claimed that the youth organisations were responsible for commissioning acts of street violence by young people, which he classified as “urban terrorism”.

In reality Jarrai and Haika were independent public, political youth organisations involved in campaigns to promote the rights of young people, and to promote independence and socialism for the Basque Country, through organising demonstrations, summer schools, youth camps and festivals.

In response to the arrests, there were demonstrations and protests held across the Basque Country. The majority of Basque political parties and trade unions spoke out against the move, saying it was an attack on the civil right of Basque youth to participate in politics. Beñat was charged with “membership of terrorist organisation” and the prosecution requested a sentence of 14 years in prison.

Beñat spent 10 months in prisons in Madrid, hundreds of kilometers from home, where he was attacked by prison guards. Beñat was then released on a €30,000 bail and did not attend the political show trial. Most of the young people who were arrested with him remained in jail for the following four years. In 2004 Beñat decided to move to Belfast to escape from Spanish political persecution and the risk of torture.

Repression Continues

In the Spanish state, the repression of the youth movement continued. In March 2002 another 11 young pro-independence activists were arrested under the same charges, accused of being members of Segi (which had been set up as a new youth organisation after the banning of Haika’s activities in 2001). In 2005, 40 pro-independence youth activists were tried in Madrid in Spain’s Audiencia Nacional (National Court, a Diplock-style political court) and 24 of them were sentenced to three years in prison. Jarrai-Haika-Segi was declared an illegal organisation. The court ruled that, while it was an “unathorised” organisation, it could not be considered “terrorist” becase it had no connection to political violence.

In 2007 the Spanish Supreme Court revised the ruling – despte there being no new evidence – and declared Jarrai-Haika-Segi to be a terrorist organisation, raising the sentence of the the 24 young activists to six years in jail.

In Matxinada, author Eoin O’Broin wrote: “By any legal standards the imprisonment and illegalisation of Jarrai, Haika and Segi are highly controversial acts. The illegalisations took place without any of the allegations having been proven in a court of law. A single investigating judge, Garzón, has effectively been able to declare groups illegal and open the way for arrests and detentions on the most spurious of evidence.”

Charges

Since Beñat moved to Belfast in January 2004 he’s become an active and well-known member of the west Belfast community and has been involved in cultural, community and solidarity work with the Basque Country. On April 22, 2009, Beñat was arrested by the PSNI following the issuing of a European Arrest Warrant by the Spanish National Court. Beñat was released the same day on £5,000 bail, under a 9pm-7am curfew and an obligation to remain within the six counties of the north of Ireland.

The European Arrest Warrant says Beñat was a member of Jarrai from 1994-2000 and that he could get a maximum of 12 years in prison. The warrant states that Beñat is a “member of a terrorist organisation” because, it claims, Jarrai was set up by ETA. It adds that Jarrai has “commissioned” several thousand acts of kale borroka (street violence), which under Spanish law is classified as “urban terrorism”.

During the period of Beñat’s alleged membership of Jarrai, the organisation was legal. The non-retrospectivity legal principle is clearly being breached by the terms of the warrant for his extradition. There is also a lack of particularity in the warrant – there are no exact dates, locations or details of participation in any offence by Beñat. There is no evidence that ETA “set up” Jarrai. The claim is part of the Spanish authorities’ mantra that “anything that surrounds ETA is ETA” – that is, any civil society organisation that shares the goal of Basque independence is “terrorist”.

In December 2008, UN human rights special rapporteur Martin Scheinin expressed concern that Spain’s Law of Political Parties defined “terrorism” so vaguely that it “might be interpreted to include any political party which through peaceful political means seeks similar political objectives” as those pursued by armed organisations.

Scheinin also spoke out against the definition of kale borroka as “terrorism”. Spontaneous protests by young people responding to political repression are often attacked by police in the Basque Country; if street fighting between police and Basque youth develops, the young people are then subject to draconian “anti-terror” legislation, which means they may face incommunicado detention and harsh prison sentences.

The Spanish authorities have used sweeping “anti-terror” legislation to try to criminalise and crush the political movement in favour of self-determination for the Basque Country, and the youth movement has faced especially severe repression.

Since the criminalisation of Segi, dozens more young activists have been arrested, tortured and jailed for years for the “crime” of political activism in favour of Basque independence and socialism, and thisreperssion is inensifying.

Beñat should never have been arrested in 2001. He and the other Basque youth activists who have been arrested are being persecuted for their political opinions and public, peaceful political work in favour of Basque independence and socialism.