Spains worst day for years
This has been a terrible terrible day. The scenes on TV showing people and bodies being dragged away from the wreckage left by the bombs have been harrowing. Hundreds of people still don't know where their families are. The government all blamed the acts on ETA this morning, but since when has ETA had the capacity and resources to launch such a massive attack on Spanish civilians? Latest reports hint at a possible Al Quaeda link (see El Pais - normally you have to pay a subscription to read news in El Pais, but today all news is free). Events like today make us all feel sick, vulnerable and very very sad. I regularly go to Madrid from Alicante, and I get off the train, or catch it, at Atocha station. At 8.00 a.m., when the bombs went off today, the station is packed with ordinary people. No politicians, no rich people (the rich people in Madrid go to work by car, because they have an underground garage supplied by their company where they can park their car), no famous people, no army corps. At this time of day, the station is jam packed with working and middle class citizens going to work, school, univeristy etc. They and their families have never done anything to deserve this. Whoever is responsible for these acts has mistaken its enemy. If it is Al Quaeda, the members of this terrorist organisation should bear in mind that over 90 percent of Spaniards were against the invasion into Irak, and remained so throughout the "war". Ordinary Spanish people (like the ones killed today) demonstrated tirelessly against the war, and argued fiercely against their government's decision to back the "allies" policy. The world is sick.