It was only one month ago that Mr Manuel Zamarano was sworn in as town councillor of the Basque town of Renteria, replacing a friend and colleague murdered last December by ETA. Yesterday he too was killed by a terrorist bomb as he walked from his home to buy a loaf of bread.
His bodyguard, a member of the Ertzaintza, the Basque autonomous police force, was injured in the blast caused when a booby-trapped motorcycle, parked on a street corner, was detonated by remote control. Although no organisation has admitted responsibility for the murder, officials are in little doubt that it was the work of ETA. Mr Zamarano would be ETA's sixth victim this year, and the seventh Popular Party councillor killed by the terrorist organisation since 1995.
Last December, Mr Jose Luis Caso, another PP town councillor in Renteria, was murdered by ETA, and within weeks, two other local councillors resigned under the pressure of terrorist threats.
Four weeks ago, Mr Zamareno agreed to step in to replace his murdered colleague and close friend, although well aware that by so doing he was putting his own life in danger. Only last weekend he received an award for his contribution to co-operation amongst the different communities. "Out of loyalty to my dead friend, I must overcome any fear," he said. He received numerous death threats, his car was set alight and graffiti can still be seen on the walls of Renteria reading: "Zamareno, you will be next!" There was almost unanimous condemnation of the murder from politicians of all persuasions, with the exception of ETA's political wing, Herri Batasuna (HB). "They will pay for this," snapped the Prime Minister, Mr Jose Maria Aznar. Replying to those who suggested that some members of HB were beginning to question violence and follow along the lines of Sinn Fein to work towards a peaceful solution in the Basque Country, the Interior Minister, Mr Jaime Mayor Oreja, declared yesterday: "Those who say that HB is changing its outlook should rethink their opinions after today's killing."
Only this week ETA announced that it was ending a semi-official truce granted seven months ago to the Ertzaintza police force. This was believed to have been an ETA reply to the Ertzaintza's recent successes in detaining terrorist suspects and seizing quantities of arms, ammunition and files on their activities.
In a raid on Tuesday they uncovered a cache of arms which included a pistol, two grenades and 700 rounds of ammunition, all half-buried in bushes just outside the town of Mondragon, near San Sebastian. A communique published in the Basque newspaper Egin, regularly used to publicise ETA statements, declared that ETA was calling off its ceasefire against: "the collaborators of the occupying Spanish forces."