Explosios in northewestern Spain

Small explosions have rattled two towns in northwestern Spain, injuring four people, after a telephoned warning in the name of the armed Basque separatist group ETA, officials said. The blasts appeared to be the latest in a series of ETA attacks aimed at Spain's summer tourism business, marking a renewed campaign by ETA after a long period of silence. The bombs were placed inside glass recycling containers in Sanxenxo and Baina, coastal towns in Galicia region that have marinas used by the well-to-do. Four people were injured at Saturday's blast in Sanxenxo near a yacht club and a sailing school, a spokeswoman for the town hall said. The explosions sprayed broken glass that caused minor cuts. Neither blast caused significant material damage, and no one was hurt in Baiona, regional officials told local media. Four other small bombs have exploded at holiday resorts on Spain's northern coast this month. ETA regularly stages summer bombing campaigns aimed at undermining tourism, a pillar of Spain's economy, although few tourists are scared away. The newspaper Gara, which often receives warnings of ETA bombs, said on its Web site an anonymous caller claiming to represent ETA had warned of Saturday's blasts. ETA has killed nearly 850 people since 1968 in a bombing and shooting campaign for an independent Basque state in northern Spain and southwestern France, but the group has been severely weakened by a police crackdown and has not killed anyone for more than a year. Spain, the United States and the European Union consider it a terrorist organisation, informs Reuter. According to NYTimes, small explosions rattled two towns in northwestern Spain on Saturday, wounding four people, after a telephone warning from a caller claiming to be from the Basque separatist group ETA, officials said. The bombs were placed inside glass recycling containers in Sanxenxo and Baiona, coastal towns in the Galicia region that have marinas. Four people were wounded in the blast in Sanxenxo, near a yacht club and a sailing school, a spokeswoman for the town hall said. The explosions sprayed broken glass that caused minor cuts. Neither blast caused significant material damage, and no one was hurt in Baiona, regional officials told the local news media. Four other small bombs attributed to ETA have exploded at holiday resorts on Spain's northern coast this month. The attacks appear to be part of a renewed campaign by the group after a long period of silence. ETA regularly stages summer bombing campaigns aimed at undermining tourism, a pillar of Spain's economy, although few tourists are scared away. ETA has killed nearly 850 people since 1968 in a bombing and shooting campaign for an independent Basque state. One of the explosions, in the northwestern Galician town of Sanxenxo slightly injured two Spaniards and two Portuguese, according to local officials. The other was detonated in a controlled explosion in the nearby marina of Baiona, which police had evacuated, publishes Channelnews. A man who described himself as a member of ETA had warned of the imminent explosions in a telephone call to the separatist Basque newspaper Gara which is generally used by ETA to claim attacks. The bombs had been placed inside glass recycling containers. The explosions followed two bombings on August 7 in seaside towns in the provinces of Cantabria and Asturias which caused some damage but no injuries. Five days later bombs exploded in two other towns in the same provinces, causing one minor injury. On August 15 a small bomb went off in Asturias but nobody was hurt. ETA, which has waged a violent three-decade plus campaign for an independent homeland in northern Spain and southern France, has been relatively inactive following a wave of arrests in both countries. It has been targeting tourist areas since 1979, in an attempt to damage Spain's economy, which is heavily dependent on the tourist industry. In the past it has hit the Mediterranean coast, the most popular with foreign tourists. The secretary of the Basque Socialist Party Patxi Lopez said the point of the latest round of attacks was "only to show that (ETA) continues to exist."

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