Nearly 60 per cent of Spaniards want to reopen government peace talks with Basque separatists ETA despite weekly opposition protests against such a move, a Catalan newspaper poll showed today.
Some 58.8 per cent of Spaniards want to resume the peace process abandoned after ETA killed two men in a December car bombing at Madrid airport, according to the poll by research firm GESOP published in the left-leaning el Periodico de Catalunya.
But 34.1 per cent said Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero should end any type of dialogue with the separatists who have killed nearly 850 people in their four decade fight for an independent Basque state.
Spaniards are divided on whether Mr Zapatero is doing a good job to end ETA's four decade fight. Around 36 per cent judged his tactics bad, or very bad and 34 per cent termed them good or very good, according to the telephone poll of 1,500 people across Spain.
Mr Zapatero's decision this month to allow hunger striking ETA prisoner Inaki de Juana Chaos to return to the Basque country was judged a mistake by 56.5 per cent of those polled by GESOP and correct by only 29.3 per cent.
Spain's opposition Popular Party holds weekly demonstrations against the government's handling of the ETA issue, which is judged the biggest problem facing Spain in opinion polls.
More than 75,000 people marched through the Navarran city of Pamplona yesterday to protest against possible inclusion of the autonomous region of Navarra in a future Basque state.
ETA's political allies Batasuna have proposed such a move and the Popular Party says the government is using Navarra, which borders the Basque country, as a bargaining chip in efforts to resume the ETA peace process.
Madrid strongly denies the accusation.
Even if ETA gave up their arms, 55.5 per cent of Spaniards would be against the formation of an independent Basque state and only 31.3 per cent in favour.
The GESOP poll, which had a 2.58 per cent margin of error, found 55.1 per cent of Spaniards thought the conservative Popular Party was behind rising political tension in Spain, which holds a general election next year, while 18.3 blamed the socialists. Some 49.5 per cent said Zapatero's party was acting more responsibly than the Popular Party, compared with 25.7 per cent support for the Popular Party over the socialists.