GUERNICA, Spain --Basque nationalism continued to worry the regime of Generalissimo Francisco Franco.
Several alleged Basque separatists and agitators had been arrested during the last few months in this northern region. Its historic and spiritual center is the old town of Guernica, a name that evokes a tragedy of the Spanish civil war of 1936-39.
El Espanol of Madrid, organ of the Ministry of Information and a main channel of Government propaganda, is leading a campaign against the outlawed Basque nationalist movement. The regime's publication asserts in almost every issue that Communists have infiltrated Basque nationalism.
In this Basque shrine members of the underground passionately deny that they are in any way linked with Communism. They stress that the Basque nationalist movement has, during the last few years, built an efficient clandestine labor organization. They assert that they enjoy the support of a large part of the local Roman Catholic clergy.
The Basque movement is circulating many clandestine leaflets and bulletins. It is said to have much influence among the workers in the iron and steel plaint and the shipyard of the region's administrative and economic capital Bilbao, 30 miles west of here, and of smaller industries in the area.
On May 1 Bilbao was the only major Spanish city to witness a major May Day workers’ demonstration against the regime.
Basque priests submitted a joint message to the Catholic Church's Ecumenical Council in the Vatican last fall, denouncing what they descirbed as violations of basic human rights by the Franco regime.
The active nationalists, although causing concern to the regime, are undoubtedly only a minority among Spain's Basques. The exact size of the Basque population is unknown because Government statistics Ignore the ethnic groups that make up the Spanish nation.
It is thought that the Basques number between two and three million representing the second largest minority in Spain after about five million Catalans.
Many Basques are prominent in big business and the Franco regime. Foreign Minister Fernando Maria Castiella y Maiz and a number of top diplomats and Government officials are Basques.
Some Basques do not even speak a word of the people's ancient language, which is unrelated to Latin or a modern Western European tongue. An early ban by the Franco regime on the Basque language has long been lifted, but the State communicates with the citizens of this region only in Spanish.
Regionalists fear that the Basque language may be swamped by Spanish and --in the French Basque country beyond the nearby border --by French.
"A. Basque secretariat" for the unification of Basque dialects and defense against French and Spanish linguistic encroachment was created in Bayonne, France, last June.
During the Spanish Civil War the Basques fought on the Republican side under their own government and president.
Nazi planes, supporting General Franco's'forces, strafed and bombed Guernica brutally April 28, 1937. Pablo Picasso's painting "Guernica" an allegory of horror, was given by him to the Republican Government and is now in the Museum of Modern Art in New York.
No trace of the war is visible here now. Guernica has been rebuilt. The town, which has a population of 7,000, looks prosperous, although the current tourist invasion bypasses it...
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