Associated Press

Spanish firemen crowd around the remains of a car bomb that exploded in Madrid, Spain, yesterday. The blast injured 60 people, including a woman and her 3-year-old child, officials said. No deaths were reported.

MADRID, Spain - A car bomb rocked a busy Madrid area during morning rush hour yesterday injuring 95 people, authorities said. Within an hour, police arrested a man and a woman suspected of setting off the explosion for the Basque separatist group ETA.

The bomb mangled more than a dozen cars and shattered windows along Corazon de Maria street in northeastern Madrid as thousands of people headed to nearby offices and schools. The street parallels the main highway to the international airport and is in one of the capital's busiest areas.

Interior Minister Mariano Rajoy said the bombers' target appeared to be Juan Junquera, secretary general of the government's scientific policy department, whose official car was passing by when the bomb went off. Junquera, a former interior and defense ministry official, was slightly injured.

Ninety-five people were treated for injuries, almost all for cuts and shock, emergency medical officials said. Only six remained hospitalized late Tuesday, including a 3-year-old child whose injuries weren't life-threatening.

Rajoy blamed the ETA, whose attacks have killed more than 800 people in car bombings and shootings in a 33-year campaign for independence of Basque regions in northern Spain and southwestern France.

"This statistic, 95 people treated, is enormously significant in terms of how far the barbarity and viciousness of some members of the human race - and I think I am very generous in calling them that - can go," Rajoy told reporters.

The explosion occurred close to the Spanish headquarters of the U.S.-based computer giant IBM and offices of the Spanish bank BBVA.

A man and woman were arrested after police received a phone call from a neighbor who reported seeing two people running from the blast site and getting into a car.

The caller then followed the getaway car in his own car and called police on a mobile phone, guiding officers who eventually moved in for the arrest.

Rajoy said the two suspects were carrying explosives, two 9-mm Parabellum handguns, wigs and false identification cards.

They were identified by the Interior Ministry as Aitor Garcia Aliaga, a suspected ETA member, and Ana Belen Egues Gurruchaga, a former town councilor for Herri Batasuna, a political party closely linked to ETA.

The ETA claimed responsibility for a car-bomb explosion Oct. 12 at a municipal garage under Plaza Colon that injured 17 people.

Last week, police arrested more than a dozen members of two organizations linked to the ETA, whose initials stand for Basque Homeland and Freedom.

The latest bombing was condemned by Spain's major political parties. However, Arnaldo Otegi of the ETA-linked Batasuna coalition said the bombing and last week's arrests were "evidence of the political conflict" and urged Spanish leaders to negotiate a solution.

Spanish Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar has ruled out talks with the ETA, saying the group must be defeated by police and legal means.