Country Reports on Terrorism 2007 - Spain

The Government of Spain and its citizens were concerned that their country has been and remained a principal target of Islamic extremism and acts of international terrorism. Al-Qa'ida (AQ) leaders Usama bin Ladin and Ayman al-Zawahiri routinely called for the recapture of the former Muslim-controlled region in Spain they still call "al-Andalus." Almost four years have passed since the March 11, 2004, Madrid train bombings without another successful Islamic extremist terrorist attack on Spanish soil, but the Spanish government remained on a heightened state of alert. Spain cooperated closely with the United States to investigate and prosecute acts of terrorism and to prevent future attacks, and worked hard to disrupt terrorist acts that possibly were directed against U.S. interests. Spain was the first EU country to sign an arrangement for the exchange of screening information on known and suspected terrorists.

Spain remained an important transit point and logistical base for terrorist organizations operating in Western Europe. Its geographic location, large population of immigrants from North Africa, and the ease of travel to other countries in Europe, made Spain a strategic crossroads for international terrorist groups and an important staging point for North African extremists heading to Iraq to join the insurgency. The Spanish government feared that experienced terrorists may soon make their way back to Spain in a reverse terrorist pipeline. Spanish media reported in July that the Iraqi terrorist group Ansar al-Islam had established a recruiting cell in Catalonia to route would-be suicide bombers from Spain to Iraq.

Spain aggressively targeted terrorist recruiters and facilitators and arrested 47 suspected terrorists in 2007, according to the Ministry of Interior. The National Court Chief Prosecutor reported that as of November, Spain held a total of 139 terrorist suspects, either under a prison sentence or awaiting trial. Many of these individuals were believed to be supporters of terrorist groups such as AQ, al-Qa'ida in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), and the Moroccan Islamic Combat Group (GICM).

For much of the year, Spain was focused on the trial of 29 individuals suspected of involvement in the Madrid train bombings that killed 191 people and wounded hundreds of others. On October 31, Spain's National Court returned guilty verdicts on 21 individuals and handed down sentences ranging from three years to almost 43,000 years in prison. Under Spanish law, the maximum jail term an individual can serve for terrorist crimes is 40 years. Only three of the individuals were convicted of complicity in the Madrid attacks; the rest were convicted for belonging to a terrorist organization, cooperating with a terrorist organization, trafficking in explosives, and/or document forgery. The Spanish government, including its law enforcement and intelligence services, government ministries, and national prosecutors and judges, came together to carry out an in-depth and comprehensive investigation, prosecution, and trial on an issue of supreme national security and political importance. The Spanish government was able to energize and bring together its interagency community in a focused and highly-effective manner. The entire process was carried out in an open, transparent, and public way, despite the emotional circumstances of the attacks and the heightened political tensions and controversies surrounding its aftermath.

Since the 1960s, Spain has battled the Basque terrorist group Basque Fatherland and Liberty (ETA). The Spanish government began 2007 sifting through the rubble of a parking garage at Madrid's Barajas Airport that was destroyed by an ETA bomb on December 30, 2006, killing two individuals and effectively ending a "permanent ceasefire" the group had declared the previous March. ETA officially ended the ceasefire on June 6, 2007, and threatened to reopen its activities "on all fronts in defense of the Basque homeland." Good police work allowed Spanish security forces to thwart a number of potentially large attacks, but ETA was able to carry out a series of smaller strikes. On October 9, an off-duty police officer was the victim of an ETA attack when a bomb attached to his vehicle exploded at mid-day in a residential section of Bilbao. The officer survived with severe burns, and two bystanders were injured in the attack. This act was noteworthy because ETA had previously taken pains to avoid innocent victims when directing attacks against governmental targets. On December 1, alleged ETA gunmen shot and killed two Spanish Civil Guard officers in southwest France, the first such assassinations since December 2002. Spain has collaborated successfully with the Governments of France and Portugal to further squeeze ETA from all sides and limit its room to maneuver. As of early December, security services had arrested 122 alleged ETA members (76 in Spain, 40 in France, six in other countries).

In February, the Spanish National Court sentenced five individuals to 13 years in jail for belonging to a terrorist organization believed to have been planning a 2006 attack against a military base in southern Spain. These individuals are known in Spain as "The Detergent Command," due to their possession of large quantities of detergents that police believed were to serve as ingredients for explosive devices.

Spain participated in the Megaports and Container Security Initiatives, and worked hard to deny terrorists access to Spanish financial institutions. Spain maintained a robust law enforcement and intelligence posture against terrorist finance. In July, Spanish police arrested two Syrian nationals on money laundering and terrorism finance charges. Spain and the United States co-chaired the OECD's Financial Action Task Force on Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing. Spain was a member of the G8's Counterterrorism Action Group and provided technical assistance to other countries to help build their institutions to counter terrorist finance. Spain and France collaborated on a project to establish a Financial Intelligence Unit in Morocco.

Spain contributed more than 700 troops to the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in Afghanistan.