Spain suffers Europe's worst terrorist attack in 15 years

The bomb explosions in Madrid's train stations on 11 March 2004, which killed at least 198 people and left 1,400 persons injured, have underlined the continuous threat of terrorism. The attacks on commuter trains came exactly two and a half years after the 11 September terrorist attacks and were Europe's worst since the 1988 bombing of a jumbo jet over Lockerbie in Scotland, which killed 270 people.

Pat Cox, European Parliament's president, said these attacks amounted to "a declaration of war on democracy" and the Parliament unanimously declared March 11 as "European day for the victims of terrorism". His sentiments reflected those of other leaders around the world. French Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin called the morning rush hour bombings "especially odious" and said they showed the need "to reinforce our areas of cooperation with Spain to combat terrorism". The French government announced that it had raised its terror alert rating following the attack, from the lowest level, yellow, up to orange.

The perpetrators of the Madrid attacks remained unknown on Friday morning, with Basque separatist group ETA and al Qaeda listed as the primary suspects. Juergen Storbeck, head of the European police organisation Europol cast doubt on Spanish government claims that ETA was responsible, he said: "the bombings "don't correspond to the modus operandi which ETA adopted up to now". Experts stressed that the bombings clearly represented a new level of terrorism in Europe.

A spokesperson from the Council told EurActiv that the Spanish attacks will be discussed by the Member States' Permanent representatives to the EU next week together with the EU strategy on the fight against terrorism.

As a mark of respect, Spain began three days of mourning on 12 March. The general elections are due to take place on 14 March (see