MADRID (AFP) – A Spanish court on Tuesday sentenced a leader of the banned Basque separatist party Batasuna to two years in jail after convicting him on charges of glorifying terrorism.

The High Court also barred Arnaldo Otegi, the former spokesman for Batasuna, the political wing of the armed separatist group ETA, from holding public office for 16 years.

Otegi, 51, went on trial last month over his presence and speech at a 2005 tribute in the Basque region to a jailed ETA member, Jose Maria Sagarduy.

During the event Otegi said the Basque region had achieved greater powers for its regional government thanks to the efforts of "Basquepolitical prisoners and refugees and many companions who we have lost in our struggle".

He also compared Sagarduy to former South African president Nelson Mandela, a Nobel peace laureate.

His lawyers had argued that he was exercising his right to free speech but the court ruled that the comments "constitute without a doubt the crime of glorifying terrorism."

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20100302/wl_afp/spainbasquesbatasunaetacourt

We need a regime change in Spain, they need to accept the US bill of rights. "We begin bombing in five minutes.."

Its entirely legal to glorify asymmetric warfare in various forms, one of which is what is correctly called "terrorism", and one is likely to do so, if opining, and if you believe this an effective policy. Which, obviously from history and game theory, it can be.

UC San Diego temporarily closes campus TV station after racial slur

February 23, 2010 | 6:45 pm

UC San Diego’s student government has temporarily shut down a campus television channel and suspended funding for 16 or so media outlets because of a student show that used a racial epithet for African Americans.

The actions, criticized by free speech advocates, came as UC San Diego was reeling from news that some students had organized an off-campus party Feb. 15 that mocked Black History Month and invited participants to dress as ghetto stereotypes.

Then, on a television segment last week, members of a controversial student satire group used the racial slur and described blacks as "ungrateful" in a discussion of the party and the campus response to it.

Associated Students President Utsav Gupta suspended the campus station and said he needed to temporarily stop funding the other media outlets while new rules are written to ensure that student fees do not support hate speech. He said he expects the matter to be resolved in a week or two and insisted that he was not advocating censorship.

The main UCSD student newspaper, The Guardian, which is not affected by the funding suspension, blasted Gupta’s actions, describing it as dictatorial and against free speech on the campus.

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2010/02/uc-san-diego-debates-campus-media-suspension.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+lanowblog+(L.A.+Now)