At trial, it was proven that they were financed by high-ranking officials in the Ministry of the Interior. The daily newspaper El Mundo played an important role in exposing GAL when it published a comprehensive series of articles about the squads.
Background
GAL operated primarily in the Basque country on the French side of the Spanish-French border, but kidnappings and torture also took place in Spain. Most victims (at least 27 dead and 26 injured) were ETA members or activist Basque nationalists, but some were not known to have links to ETA or any other organization advocating political violence. GAL was active from 1983 to 1987, a period known as la guerra sucia ("the dirty war") in Spanish history.
Its main purposes were to attack ETA members and Basque nationalist targets and to wreak havoc in French territory to put pressure on the French government. Apart from the nationalist rationale for its opposition to Basque separatism, GAL was not on the left–right political spectrum; many members were foreign mercenaries. Many of these mercenaries were recruited from the European far right (including the OAS), however, and many perpetrators and organizers were active or former Francoist civil servants.[1]
From its beginning, GAL attacks indicated a close connection to high-ranking officials in the PSOE government and a number of police officials in the Basque Country.[1] In addition to GAL operatives, several Spanish police officers and government officials were convicted and imprisoned when the operation ended. Interior Minister José Barrionuevo and his associate, Rafael Vera, were convicted of the kidnapping of Segundo Marey.[2]Gipuzkoa governor Julen Elgorriaga and Civil Guard general Enrique Rodríguez Galindo were found guilty of the murder of Joxe Antonio Lasa and Joxe Ignacio Zabala in October 1983.[3]
After the assassination of PSOE Senator Enrique Casas by the CAA, PSOE officials attempted to assassinate Herri Batasuna representative Santi Brouard. Would-be assassin Jose Luis Morcillo received 7.5 million pesetas from high-ranking Civil Guard official Rafael Masa, as ordered by Spanish State Security chief director Julian Sancristobal. Part of the payment for the attempt on Brouard's life, however, was diverted to unknown purposes.[4][5]
Memorial demonstration for Joxe Antonio Lasa and Joxe Ignacio Zabala in 2008
Prosecutors proved that the police officers who recruited mercenaries and the government officials who organized the dirty-war operations also embezzled large amounts of public money. Rafael Vera and others were sentenced for illegal appropriation of funds from the Interior Ministry. To ensure their silence, the PSOE government bribed inspector José Amedo Fouce and Michel Domínguez. Vera was sentenced to 18 months in prison, and his secretary received a nine-month sentence.[6]
The death squads were an important issue during the 1996 election, when the PSOE was defeated by José María Aznar's People's Party (PP) for the first time. González then resigned as PSOE leader. With the exception of Ricardo García Damborenea,[9] PSOE leaders have never acknowledged responsibility for the GAL or condemned their crimes. González, who has never been charged with a GAL-related offence, has called publicly for pardons for his former subordinates. PSOE leaders campaigned for leniency towards their former colleagues, and the Aznar government pardoned several of them.
Timeline
1983
October 17: Kidnapping and assassination of alleged ETA members Joxe Lasa Arostegi and José Ignacio Zabala.[10] Their mutilated bodies were found in Alicante in 1985, but not formally identified until 1995.[10] Several Civil Guard officers were convicted.
October 18: Attempted kidnapping in Bayonne of alleged ETA leader José Mari Larretxea Goñi by four Spanish policemen.[11] The four officers were arrested by French gendarmes.
December 4: Kidnapping of Segundo Marey[11] by mercenaries hired by the Spanish police, who demanded the liberation of the four police officers arrested for the attempted kidnapping of Larraetxea. The officers were released on December 8, and Marey on December 13. Marey, not related to ETA, was apparently kidnapped by mistake.
December 19: Assassination of alleged ETA member Ramón Oñaederra in Bayonne[11]
December 29: Assassination of alleged ETA leader Mikel Goikoetxea in Saint-Jean-de-Luz[11] by a mercenary sniper
1984
February 8: Assassination of alleged ETA members Vicente Perurena and Angel Gurmindo in Hendaye[12]
February 25: Sniper assassination of alleged ETA member Eugenio Gutiérrez Salazar in Mendi[11]
March 1: Assassination of railroad worker Jean Pierre Leyba in Hendaye[11]
March 19: GAL mercenary Jean-Pierre Cherid dies in Biarritz[11] when the bomb he is planting explodes prematurely.
March 23: Assassination of alleged ETA leader Javier Pérez Arenaza in Biarritz[11]
May 3: Assassination of alleged ETA member Rafael Goikoetxea in Baigorri. His companion, Jesús Zugarramurdi, is injured.[11] ETA kills industrialist Ángel Rodríguez, whom they accused of assisting the GAL, that day.[11]
May 26: Kidnapping and torture of Rafael and Endika Lorenzo, members of the anti-nuclear committees in Algorta (Getxo, Biscay)
June 15: Assassination of alleged ETA member Tomás Pérez Revilla by a bomb hidden in a motorcycle in Biarritz. His companion, Ramón Orbe, is injured.[11]
July 10: Bomb attack on the Consolation tavern, injuring three[11]
November 18: Assassination of dancer Christian Olaskoaga in Biriatou. Olaskoaga was not known to have ETA connections.[11]
August 31: Assassination of Dominique Labeyrie in St. Jean de Luz.[11] Labeyrie had no known ETA connections.
September 25: Monbar Hotel attack in Bayonne kills ETA members José Mari Etxaniz, Iñaki Asteazu Izarra, Agustín Irazustabarrena and Sabin Etxaide Ibarguren.[13]
December 24: Robert Caplanne is fatally injured in Biarritz. Caplanne had no known ETA connections.
1986
February 8: Attack on the Batxoki tavern injures three.
February 17: Assassination of Christophe Matxikote and Catherine Brion, who had no ETA connections. GAL did not claim responsibility but Miguel Brecia (with known links to the groups) was convicted of the attack, and the court considered it a GAL attack.[14]
1987
July 24: Assassination of Juan Carlos García Goena, unconnected with ETA. Although GAL did not claim responsibility, the mercenaries who killed him accused GAL of ordering it.
Convicted members
José Barrionuevo, interior minister in PSOE cabinets from 1982 to 1988
Rafael Vera, director of state security
Ricardo García Damborenea, secretary general of PSE-PSOE in Biscay
Francisco Álvarez, antiterrorist czar
Miguel Planchuelo, chief of Bilbao's Police Information Brigade
José Amedo Fouce, police chief
Julián Sancristóbal, gobernador civil (delegate of the Spanish government) in Biscay
Members of Batasuna gave the name "Green GAL" to a Civil Guard group (who wear green uniforms) based in San Sebastián's Intxaurrondo barracks, alleging that the group attacked ETA members illegally.
