As a protest against the Spanish government’s policy of keeping them in separate prisons away from the Basque region and asking to be recognized as political prisoners, prisoners belonging to the separatist group Euskadi Ta Askatasuna (ETA) said on Monday that they were going to start a hunger strike in prisons in France and Spain.
According to the newspaper Gara, the prisoners have planned to start a hunger strike as part of a series of protests which originated early this month, and include fasting, and declining opportunities to make phone calls and going out to the yard. However, the Spanish prison administration has said that these protests have had low following among the prisoners.
More than 700 prisoners are being kept in French and Spanish prisons for being ETA members or helping the terrorist outfit.
The ETA is said to be responsible for the deaths of close to 800 people in the last 40 years or so, in its quest for an autonomous Basque state.
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