Mobilisation called for in Spain

Press, Volume CXV, Issue 33964, 3 October 1975, Page 9

Mobilisation called for in Spain

iA’eu) Zealand Press Association—Copyright)

MADRID, October 2.

Military leaders have called for “total mobilisation to preserve Spain’s beleaguered Right-wing regime as “the last bulwark against communism” in Europe.

1 he commanders pledged unswerving loyalty to the ageing General Francisco Franco in the face of increasing guerrilla warfare and international isolation.

“There is no other, remedy for us but the: total mobilisation of all: our means without re-' strictions on their use,”! General Carlos Franco; Gonzalez, commander of; the Galicia region, said 1 yesterday. His remarks came asi guerrillas shot three policemen to death in Madrid and the European Economic Community called off trade talks with the Spanish Government. Lying in state The bodies of the three slain officers were taken to! the police academy in Madrid for today’s funeral. Sobbing families stood before the open coffins as the bodies lay in State. The general told a proFranco rally that Left-wing guerrillas and Basque separatists had launched "a true subversive war” against the troubled Spanish Government. ‘‘The objectives of our enemy are the destruction of our regime, the last bulwark against communism remaining in Europe.” he said. He accused Western Europe’s “wasted and stupid” nations of trying to pressure Spain into giving “vulgar assassins a green light to shoot us in the back.” Negotiations halted The nine-nation Common Market suspended trade negotiations with Spain yesterday to protest against the execution of five Spanish guerrillas last week-end. “In the present circumstances, it is not possible to go ahead with the negotiations with Spain,” a Market spokesman said in Brussels. General Salvador Banuls, commander of the Catalonia region, told a Barcelona rally: “The Armed Forces are at Franco’s orders” and “have no doubts of our

mission nor fears to carry it out.”

Western European countries appeared to congratulate him in the palace. The United States was represented by Mr Samuel Eaton, its deputy chief of mission, along with diplomats from the Arab, Asian, African, and Latin American countries.

The shootings in Madrid came before 82-year-old General Franco addressed a huge ! rally marking the thirty-ninth : anniversary of his rise to power. Guerrillas have , killed 22 policemen this year. General Franco, wearing a ■dark blue uniform with a red I sash, blamed Spain’s troubles : on “Left-wing Masons” I abroad and “Communist terrorist subversion” at home. A crowd of hundreds of thousands shouted “Franco. Franco,” and “Montini up against the wall” during the general’s emotion choked, five-minute speech. ! The Roman Catholic 'crowd’s attack against Pope Paul VI — Giovanni Battista [Montini — came after the ' Pontiff expressed regrets over the execution of the guerrillas. Fears grow The “New York Times” said that the renewed cycle of violence and the massive patriotic and almost xenophobic demonstration made ; yesterday one of the most dramatic days in Madrid since the end of the Civil War in 1939. Fears were greater than ever among moderate forces seeking peaceful change that extremists were taking over the political scene as in Civil War days. The day coincided with the thirty-ninth anniversary of Franco’s assumption of the title of chief of a new Spanish State in Burgos at the start of the Civil War in 1936. In 1946 he held the first four mass rallies as a show of defiance to the world which then shunned his regime. This morning, just before the demonstration, he was able to measure the extent of the country’s new isolation. At the traditional reception for high dignatories and the diplomatic corps, not a single representative of

It was not known whether Franco had been informed of the renewed terrorism in Madrid. The attacks, in four widely-separated parts of the city, occurring within a few minutes of one another, indicated a carefully-planned and co-ordinated answer to official efforts to stamp out terrorism.