TENED EN CUENTA que está escrito para una audiencia internacional que no conoce todos los detalles, y estaréis de acuerdo en que The Economist hace un repaso más que razonable a la situación derivada del Plan Ibarretxe. Incluso califican a ETA como "terrorist group", toda una novedad. Aquí tenéis el principio, pero vale la pena leerlo entero:

SO FAR this month, the new year talk in Spain has been mostly of constitutional crisis. In Madrid there are dark mutterings about the disintegration of the state. The king and the bishops have pontificated on the sanctity of the constitution. And Spain's defence minister, José Bono, has issued a blunt warning that “no territory may engage in projects which violate the sovereign will of all Spaniards.”

The fuss began after the Basque parliament voted on December 30th to approve the Ibarretxe plan (named after the regional premier, Juan José Ibarretxe), which seeks to redefine relationships with Madrid and provide for a possible referendum on becoming “a free state associated with Spain”. The vote for the plan was won only after a last-minute U-turn by three deputies from Batasuna (now called Sozialista Abertzaleak), the banned political wing of the ETA terrorist group. Batasuna had said the plan did not go far enough. By changing his mind, Batasuna's leader, Arnaldo Otegi, who controls seven seats that were won when the party was legal, wrong-footed Mr Ibarretxe's own moderate Basque Nationalist Party.

ACTUALIZACIÓN. Siento no haberme dado cuenta de que el artículo era sólo accesible con suscripción. De todos modos, veo que algún buen samaritano (no miro a nadie) ha colgado el texto íntegro en los comentarios, por si lo queréis leer.