Madrid mourns bomb victims

Press, 16 July 1986, Page 10

Madrid mourns bomb victims

NZPA-Reuter Madrid A three-minute silence was observed in Madrid yesterday in mourning for nine Civil Guards killed in a bomb attack on Monday.

The police combed the city for the killers who set off a bomb that ripped apart a bus carrying 58 members of the paramilitary force in a Madrid residential area. More than 40 Civil Guards and passers-by were injured. The bus was packed with Civil Guard traffic patrol school students, aged 19 to 24. . “There is a tight security net on the city in areas where the police believe the killers may be in hiding,” said a Government spokeswoman.

“We cannot discard the possibility that they are somewhere in the city,” she said.

The police suspect the Basque separatist guerrilla organisation, E.T.A,, which usually selects Civil Guards as targets in its

campaign of violence for a separate Basque State. The bombing was almost identical to a car bomb explosion which killed five Civil Guards in Madrid in April. E.T.A. took responsibility for that attack.

The Mayor of Madrid, Mr Juan Barranco, called for a city-wide three-min-ute silent vigil to protest against the bombing.

Traffic and businesses came to a halt at noon.

It was the worst guerrilla attack in Madrid since suspected Palestinian bombers killed 18 people at a restaurant frequented by American servicemen in April, 1985. The police said the car, packed with 50kg of explosives and shrapnel, had been parked at the central Republics Dominicana square for more than a month. E.T.A.’s structure in the northern Basque region has been badly damaged by police arrests in the last six months.