"Democracy has given ETA three opportunities to finish its dreadful campaign of senseless crimes," Zapatero said, referring to the attempts at negotiations made by him and his two predecessors. "ETA has wasted the three opportunities. There will not be any others," the Socialist leader said at a news conference following the last cabinet meeting of 2008. The government began talks with ETA after the group declared a "permanent ceasefire" in March 2006. But the government called them off after ETA detonated a car bomb at Madrid airport nine months later, killing two people. ETA officially announced the end of the ceasefire in June 2007 and has assassinated six people since then. Zapatero highlighted the recent blows dealt to ETA, including the arrests of the group's suspected military chief Garikoitz Aspiazu, also known as Txeroki, in November and his alleged successor three weeks later.
