The cooler

Just read an article in the New York Times about Arnaldo Otegi, the basque separatist leader who will be released from prison tomorrow after 6 years inside. I remember how continuously surprised I was that the authorities, in what should be a modern european country, prior to this six year term, had already been able to imprison someone, Mr. Otegi, through dubious interpretation of spoken word, some might say free speech. There had been no violence in his words, neither proven or sought to be proven, rather a suggestion of sedition, something that made the authorities uncomfortable. That sentence partly served was quickly followed by the longer sentence (originally 10 years) for having tried to form a political party seen to have links to the violent struggle. The peaceful route for the basque cause had already been embraced by Otegi; it was all a bit weird; as it is the NYT quotes a written statement by Mr. Otegi, from prison, as stating, in his view, that the Spanish government had no real interest in the disappearance of the violent struggle; [in my words now] suggesting that it gave them (the govt) justification to impose the greater control that promoted their interests in the Basque country.

That has also reminded me of the incident a couple of weeks ago when a two theatre puppeteers spent four days in prison in Madrid for having shown a banner during a puppet theatre production, that made a provocative (cheeky or bad taste) word-tie between the names of the Basque movement, ETA, and Al Qaida. .. worse maybe, someone had mistakenly booked these puppeteers for a children's hour! There was violence in that production and what-not (actually what puppet performance never has violence in it, whether it be the housemaid with a rolling pin or clown with a stick), not cool stuff for kids; but it was the 'excusing terrorism', something so subtle that most of the children wouldn't even have noticed, that got the goat of the judge and caused the puppeteers their undignified 'cooling-off' time in the cooler !! That'll sort 'em out!