Read :  ETA's suspected military chief arrested

The arrest of the suspected military chief of the Basque separatist group ETA in France on Monday is a major blow to the hardliners that make up the core of the group, which has already been weakened by a series of detentions, analysts and government officials said.
  
Political columnist Alberto Surio of the Basque daily Diario Vasco said the detention of Miguel de Garikoitz Aspiazu Rubina, alias "Txeroki", had "decapitated" the hardliners and paved the way for the rise of the minority within the outfit that favoured peace talks with the government.
  
"Txeroki represented the hardline and was a reference for the new, very  radicalized generation, now that he has been sidelined this reference loses credibility and strengthens other sectors," he told AFP.
  
"There is a political wing within ETA which never understood why the peace process was broken off and which wants to change strategy," said Surio, adding the detention "will at least open a period of internal debate".
  
His arrest in the French ski resort of Cauterets is the biggest blow against ETA since the group's presumed leader, Javier Lopez Pena, was detained along with three other suspected members of the group in France in May.
  
Spanish police believe the 35-year-old is connected to all the major ETA operations carried out since late 2003 when he took over the outfit's military operations.
  
He is linked to a Madrid airport bomb attack in December 2006 that killed two Ecuadorian men and led the socialist government of Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero to end its tentative peace talks with ETA.
  
Earlier this month Spanish Interior Minister Alfredo Perez Rubalcaba said two suspected members of ETA who were detained in October had identified "Txeroki" as the gunman shot dead two young Spanish police officers outside a cafe in southwestern France.
  
The attack came just six months after ETA formally called off the "permanent ceasefire" which it announced in March 2006, saying it had grown tired of a lack of concessions on the part of the government in their peace talks.
  
"With this detention ETA has suffered a hard blow to its organisation and its capacity. Today ETA is weaker and Spanish democracy stronger," Zapatero told a news conference just hours after "Txeroki" was detained.
  
ETA, whose symbol is a snake wrapped around an axe, is blamed for 824 deaths in its 40-year campaign of bombings and shootings for independence for Basque territories in northern Spain and southern France.
  
Florencio Dominguez Iribarren, the editor-in-chief of Basque news agency Vasco Press who has written books on ETA, however said the outfit would not change its hardline position overnight because of the arrest of "Txeroki".
  
"It will not change its line, the current position was decided jointly," he told AFP.
  
In a statement released earlier this month, ETA vowed to keep up its armed fight for an independent Basque homeland until the Spanish government resumes negotiations and claimed responsibility for 10 recent attacks, including the shooting of the two police officers in France.
  
"The resistance will continue as long as the rights of Euskal Herria are not recognized and respected," the group said, using the Basque language name for the Basque Country.
  
Since ETA officially called off its ceasefire, it has been responsible for a total of five deaths, including the two police officers shot in France.
  
Zapatero has ruled out any further talks with the group, which is considered a terrorist organisation by the European Union and the United States.