Basque National Liberation Movement prisoners

Basque National Liberation Movement prisoners are all those people who have been imprisoned, placed on remand, or otherwise kept in custody due to their illegal activity in support of the Basque National Liberation Movement (MLNV using its Spanish acronym). Most individuals linked to the MLNV currently serving out their sentences in prisons of Spain, France and other countries were convicted for their involvement with Euskadi Ta Askatasuna (ETA) at the moment of their arrest, and for other offences such as murder, attempted murder, participating in terrorism and kidnapping. Some were convicted only for being a member of ETA, while others were not members of ETA but have been imprisoned for collaborating with it, or have been convicted of other offences such as belonging to illegal organizations like Gestoras pro Amnistía or SEGI, belonging to or trying to rebuild banned political parties such as Askatasuna and Batasuna, participating in Kale borroka, or for the "public glorification of terrorism", an offence incorporated into the Spanish Criminal Code in 1995. Many supporters of the Basque nationalist left consider ETA and MLNV convicts currently in Spanish and French prisons to be political prisoners, the majority of whom are represented by the Basque Political Prisoners Collective (EPPK under its Basque acronym). Some organizations like Etxerat have spent many years campaigning for the rights of Basque prisoners, with a special focus on bringing dispersed prisoners back to the Basque Country and the release of seriously ill prisoners. Since the late 1960s tens of thousands of MLNV activists have been detained, and several thousands of those imprisoned. Up until 2003 an estimated 30,000 activists had been arrested, 8,172 of whom were accused of being members of ETA, out of which 4,770 were convicted of a criminal offence and served a prison sentence. A notable convicted MLNV leader is former ETA-member Arnaldo Otegi, who was released in 2016 after six year in prisons for attempting to re-establish the outlawed party Batasuna, despite having received conviction in an unfair trial.