A car bomb exploded in a parking lot at Madrid's new airport terminal yesterday after a warning call from the Basque separatist group ETA, officials said. Three people were slightly injured.
The blast halted all air traffic on one of the year's busiest travel days and brought a fiery end to a nine-month-old ETA ceasefire that had spurred the greatest hopes in a decade of a peaceful end to the conflict.
Two warning calls were received in the Basque region just before the explosion. In the second call, a man claimed responsibility on behalf of the separatists, the Basque Interior Department's emergency rescue services said.
The bomb exploded at about 9:30am at the airport's new Terminal 4, said Javier Ayuso, a spokesman for the emergency rescue services of the Madrid city government.
A column of thick smoke rose from the blast site more than an hour after the explosion and the building housing the parking lot appeared to be on fire.
The terminal was evacuated and the airport was closed, said Iberia, the Spanish flagship carrier that runs most flights out of the terminal.
The Civil Guard -- a paramilitary police agency under Interior Ministry command -- said the blast was from a car bomb.
Among the injured were a policeman with cuts from flying glass and two other people with light injuries, Ayuso said.
The explosion came a few hours after the execution in Baghdad of former Iraqi president Saddam Hussein, leading to some initial fears that Islamic militants might be involved.
The bombing seemed sure to be the nail in the coffin of a nascent peace effort championed by Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero.
ETA has not killed anyone since May 2003, but continued a series of low-level bombings until just before the ceasefire.
More than 800 people have died since the group took up arms in the late 1960s.
MORE VISITORS: The Tourism Administration said that it is seeing positive prospects in its efforts to expand the tourism market in North America and Europe Taiwan has been ranked as the cheapest place in the world to travel to this year, based on a list recommended by NerdWallet. The San Francisco-based personal finance company said that Taiwan topped the list of 16 nations it chose for budget travelers because US tourists do not need visas and travelers can easily have a good meal for less than US$10. A bus ride in Taipei costs just under US$0.50, while subway rides start at US$0.60, the firm said, adding that public transportation in Taiwan is easy to navigate. The firm also called Taiwan a “food lover’s paradise,” citing inexpensive breakfast stalls
TRADE: A mandatory declaration of origin for manufactured goods bound for the US is to take effect on May 7 to block China from exploiting Taiwan’s trade channels All products manufactured in Taiwan and exported to the US must include a signed declaration of origin starting on May 7, the Bureau of Foreign Trade announced yesterday. US President Donald Trump on April 2 imposed a 32 percent tariff on imports from Taiwan, but one week later announced a 90-day pause on its implementation. However, a universal 10 percent tariff was immediately applied to most imports from around the world. On April 12, the Trump administration further exempted computers, smartphones and semiconductors from the new tariffs. In response, President William Lai’s (賴清德) administration has introduced a series of countermeasures to support affected
CROSS-STRAIT: The vast majority of Taiwanese support maintaining the ‘status quo,’ while concern is rising about Beijing’s influence operations More than eight out of 10 Taiwanese reject Beijing’s “one country, two systems” framework for cross-strait relations, according to a survey released by the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) on Thursday. The MAC’s latest quarterly survey found that 84.4 percent of respondents opposed Beijing’s “one country, two systems” formula for handling cross-strait relations — a figure consistent with past polling. Over the past three years, opposition to the framework has remained high, ranging from a low of 83.6 percent in April 2023 to a peak of 89.6 percent in April last year. In the most recent poll, 82.5 percent also rejected China’s
PLUGGING HOLES: The amendments would bring the legislation in line with systems found in other countries such as Japan and the US, Legislator Chen Kuan-ting said Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Chen Kuan-ting (陳冠廷) has proposed amending national security legislation amid a spate of espionage cases. Potential gaps in security vetting procedures for personnel with access to sensitive information prompted him to propose the amendments, which would introduce changes to Article 14 of the Classified National Security Information Protection Act (國家機密保護法), Chen said yesterday. The proposal, which aims to enhance interagency vetting procedures and reduce the risk of classified information leaks, would establish a comprehensive security clearance system in Taiwan, he said. The amendment would require character and loyalty checks for civil servants and intelligence personnel prior to
RSS