Basque youth group sees NI as an example

The Northern Ireland peace process has set an example the Spanish government should follow in dealing with the Basque Country, according to members of a militant Basque youth organisation who are on a fact-finding visit to Ireland.

Jarai, whose members are here as guests of Young Sinn Fein, will meet republican prisoners in Portlaoise, the Maze and Maghaberry prisons, and will be briefed by Sinn Fein leaders during a 10-day stay in Ireland. The group will also visit Portadown next weekend to observe events surrounding the Drumcree parade.

"Many many eyes in the Basque Country are looking at Ireland," a spokesman, Mr Josetxo Otegi, said in Dublin yesterday. But a party colleague, Ms Ana Lizarralde, said the Spanish government had yet to learn the lesson that it must negotiate with Basque separatists: "The only solution it has to offer at the moment is repression."

The group denied any links between Jarai and ETA, the Basque paramilitary organisation.

The spokespeople also denied that Jarai orchestrated street violence throughout the Basque Country. "There has always been street violence. It was happening before Jarai and it will continue as long as the political problem continues," Ms Lizarralde said.

A spokesman for Young Sinn Fein said the importance attached to the visit could be gauged from the fact that the delegation would be briefed on the peace process by the Sinn Fein chairman, Mr Mitchel McLaughlin, and would be met by the IRA leaders in each of the prisons.