Two gunmen believed to be Eta Basque separatists shot dead a 71-year-old businessman in a carpark in the Basque town of Azpeitia today, Spanish police and local authorities said.
The victim, named by authorities as Ignacio Uria, was one of the owners of construction company Altuna y Uria which is building a stretch of the high-speed train AVE long named by ETA as a target.
"Two young men jumped out of a car and fired two shots at him," a witness told radio station Cadena SER.
The shooting happened a day before Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero was due to visit the region to talk with Basque business people.
Deputy Prime Minister Maria Teresa Fernandez de la Vega condemned the attack, as did the leader of the opposition Popular Party, Mariano Rajoy.
It follows the arrest in France just over two weeks ago of ETA's suspected chief, Garikoitz Aspiazu, nicknamed 'Txeroki' or 'Cherokee'.
ETA separatists have killed more than 800 people in four decades of struggle for the independence of ancient Basque territories in France and Spain.
Polls indicate only a small minority of support for them in Spain's Basque Country region, which already enjoys considerable autonomy.
ETA has said the building of the high-speed train link connecting the Basque cities of Vitoria, San Sebastian and Bilbao to the Spanish capital Madrid is not in the interests of Basque people.
Reuters