By
The Associated Press
MADRID, Spain - A car bomb exploded in the Spanish capital yesterday, killing a Supreme Court judge, his driver and his police escort and wounding 35 in the bloodiest attack blamed on Basque separatists since they ended a cease-fire last December.
The 44-pound bomb hurled jagged glass and metal around an upper-middle class neighborhood of northeastern Madrid, shattering windows for blocks. The driver of a passing bus suffered severe injuries and 34 other bystanders were cut, scorched or bruised. Several cars were gutted.
Blazing debris billowed white smoke, limiting visibility just after the attack as dozens of ambulances, police cars and fire trucks struggled to set up an emergency medical tent, douse flames and search for the killers.
The slain judge, 69-year-old Jose Francisco Querol, worked for a military section of Spain's Supreme Court. He held the rank of general and was due to retire next month, judiciary officials said. Also killed were his driver, Armando Medina Sanchez, and Jesus Escudero Garcia, a member of the national police force.
Although no group claimed responsibility for the attack, politicians and police immediately blamed the Basque separatist group ETA. The group has repeatedly used car bombs as part of its 32-year-old campaign for an independent Basque homeland in an area straddling northern Spain and southwest France.
"This morning we were again invaded by the pain of blind terrorism. ETA has caused a terrible attack in Madrid," King Juan Carlos said. "To the assassins goes our firm condemnation and the certainty that they will pay for their crimes sooner or later."
Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar urged Spaniards not to despair over ETA's continuing violence and vowed to keep to his policy of combatting the group through police measures rather than talks.
"It is clear that no one will achieve any kind of objective through the force of violence, and that no one will make Spaniards yield to threats of guns, whoever may be holding them," said Aznar, who survived an ETA assassination attempt in 1995.
Yesterday's attack came at 9:15 a.m. as people were going to work and children to schools in the Arturo Soria area of Madrid.
As the judge drove past an intersection, a parked car rigged with a bomb was detonated by remote control, police said. Querol lived nearby, and his wife and daughter heard the blast at home.
The city bus waiting to turn into the intersection was severely damaged, its front section gutted by flames and its windows blown out. The driver was in critical condition: the bomb blew off a piece of his skull, severely burned him and left him with internal injuries, said emergency medical services spokesman Emilio Benito. He said few passengers were aboard the bus, and none was critically hurt.
Stunned neighbors, a few in housecoats and bedclothes, crowded around television sets for news in local cafes or comforted each other on park benches. Some were prohibited from returning to the crumbled drywall and scattered glass of their homes before safety inspections.
"That's the bus my son takes every day," said Rosario Castilla, who lives in a building 20 yards from the attack. "The bomb burned half of my other son's car. I heard the explosion and then I had a nervous breakdown."
Castilla paused to comfort an elderly neighbor who, in an evident state of shock and still dressed in a red housecoat, wandered from a neighboring apartment for company.
"I was just waking up when I heard a tremendous explosion. It blew out my windows and I put my arms over my head," said 24-year-old Ricardo Villaverde, his face scratched by shards of flying glass. "I looked out the window and people were crazy and panicking in street."
ETA has killed some 800 people since 1968 and is now blamed for 19 deaths since it ended a 14-month cease-fire last December. The last attack blamed on ETA was Oct. 22, when a prison officer was killed by a bomb attached to his car in the Basque city of Vitoria. Madrid has been hit by four bombings so far this year.
The death toll in yesterday's blast was the highest since the cease-fire ended. Twice - on Feb. 22 and again on Aug. 20 - two people died in car bombings blamed on ETA.
ETA made no immediate statement. The group usually takes weeks to claim responsibility for attacks, and often does so in communiques to a pro-independence Basque newspaper.
As evening fell, thousands of people gathered in the Puerta del Sol, a downtown plaza in Madrid, to protest yesterday's attack. The rally began with five minutes of silence. Similar demonstrations were held in the Basque cities of Vitoria, Bilbao and San Sebastian.
A larger demonstration was planned for today in Madrid. A funeral ceremony for the victims was to be held today at the Supreme Court.
