TERRORIST FINANCE: ETA YOUTH DEMONSTRATE IN

UNCLAS THE HAGUE 001959

SIPDIS

State for EB/ESC/ESP, S/CT, EUR/ERA, EUR/WE, EUR/UBI, INR/EC

Treasury for Aufhauser, Zarate, Fox

Justie for OIA/Friedman

Brussels also for Legatt

E.O. 12958 N/A
TAGS: ETTC PTER SP NL EUN
SUBJECT: TERRORIST FINANCE: ETA YOUTH DEMONSTRATE IN
AMSTERDAM DESPITE EU DESIGNATION


1. The Basque youth movement Segi held a small
demonstration in the Netherlands this weekend despite its
being designated by the EU as a terrorist organization
"internal" to Europe and by the Dutch government under its
national sanctions law as a group with whom financial
transactions are prohibited and accounts blocked. Segi held
demonstrations and information evenings in Nijmegen and
Amsterdam on Saturday, August 2. On Sunday, it demonstrated
at the prison in Alphen aan de Rijn, where alleged ETA
activist Alexander Akarregi is awaiting extradition to
Spain. The demonstrations occurred without incidents.


2. The Amsterdam Public Prosecutors Office said that it
could take no action to stop the demonstration under the
Dutch sanctions law unless the group was receiving financial
contributions. The Dutch also investigated whether it could
take action against individuals who may have accepted
financial transactions from the group in return for goods
and services. Dutch authorities could make no case because
the demonstrators traveled here by minibus from Spain and
lodged in squatters' housing. Thus, the only expenses the
demonstrators incurred in the Netherlands were for small
purchases of food and gasoline - transactions that would be
difficult to prosecute.


3. Some political leaders, Christian Democratic MP Camille
Eurlings and Liberal Party floorleader in the Amsterdam city
council Frits Huffnagel, criticized the "lenient" attitude
of the Dutch prosecutor's office. "The meeting in
Amsterdam should have been discouraged by way of making
clear that Segi is not welcome here," said Eurlings. "I
plan on asking the government how the prosecutor's office's
position tallies with the government's intention to ban
organizations listed on the EU list." Huffnagel opined that
the meeting should have been banned. "If it had been a
meeting of the youth organization of the Flemish Bloc, they
certainly would have taken action. Now that it is a leftist
group, all kinds of legal obstacles are suddenly raised."

Russel