75 y.o. Basque conscience prisoner, with cancer, allowed atenuated prison

Jose Luis Elkoro, 75, was given yesterday the attenuated prison status (home imprisonment), allowing him to go back to his home in Bergara and receive medical treatment for his prostate cancer.

Elkoro was jailed intermittently for being the president of the editorial board of Orain S.A., the company that owed Egin newspaper, which was closed in a clear case of judicial persecution of freedom of speech in 1998. This anti-democratic political move inaugurated a new era of generalized repression against Basque society, which under the theory of "all is ETA", persecuted nearly anything: newspapers, radios, political parties, all kind of associations, effectively removing a huge social segment from normal political and social activity.

Elkoro was arrested last time in 2009 and since then there has been a local campaign at his hometown for his release. He was finally allowed to return home, under heavy restrictions.

Besides his labor as journalist and manager, he also exerted political activity in the last many decades. Elkoro participated for instance in the negotiations that led to the general amnesty of 1978 or the legalization of the Basque ensign earlier that decade. He was mayor of Bergara in that time and eventually was a main promoter of the newspaper Egin, which, besides of being associated with certain political sectors, was a key journal making research journalism, denouncing corruption and doing the labor we all expect from the media but that they seldom deliver.

Elkoro was also an important member of Herri Batasuna (People's Union, left wing Basque nationalist party), being elected to the parliaments of Gipuzkoa, the Western Basque autonomous entity and the state of Spain. As member of the Spanish parliament in a time when his party had finally decided to occupy their seats, he was present in the meeting at Hotel Alcalá in 1989, when they were shooted by Spanish terrorists, who murdered his colleague Josu Muguruza and injured Tasio Erkizia. After this attack Herri Batasuna decided to remain out of the Spanish parliament, even if they were entitled to participate.

In the gigantic political trial 18/98, he was sentenced to 24 years of prison for being the chief responsible of Egin newspaper, sentence that was later lowered to 8 years. He was first imprisoned in 2007 but released three days later. In April 2009 he was arrested again and remained in prison until yesterday.

Source: Gara[es].