The last known chief of ETA goes on trial Monday in Paris for terrorism charges that he deems “absurd” because of his role in ending a conflict that claimed hundreds of lives and terrorized Spain for half a century. @AP_Europe https://apnews.com/article/virus-outbreak-zaragoza-paris-trials-violence-4bbc339d57007b302ec016d2fd960198

Josu Urrutikoetxea led ETA during one of its bloodiest periods, when its victims included children bombed to death while sleeping in a Zaragoza police compound, where a monument to their stolen lives now stands.

In a rare interview after 17 years on the run, he offered an apology, advised other separatist movements against resorting to violence and painted himself as a changed man, a preposterous claim to those who lost loved ones to ETA’s violence.

ETA caused around 850 deaths and thousands of injuries and hijacked the Basque and Spanish political debate for decades. Just because Urrutikoetxea oversaw ETA’s end in 2018, survivors and relatives of ETA's victims stress, that doesn’t erase his past.

Spanish anti-terrorism investigators have depicted him as a bloodthirsty advocate of violence who only opportunistically pursued negotiations after police crackdowns and a shrinking support base from Basque separatists weakened ETA.

Now 69, diminished by a battle with cancer and facing the prospect of spending the twilight of a life devoted to Basque independence behind bars, the man widely known by his police alias Josu Ternera, or “The Calf,” says he’s sorry for the “irreparable damage” caused by ETA.

Even when he admits regrets, he adds a caveat. Asked if he would apologize to ETA victims’ families, he told The Associated Press: “Of course, (I offer) apologies for something that we can’t repair.” But he insisted Basque’s independence movement suffered, too.

It suffered, he said, from violence rooted in the Spanish dictatorship that ended more than four decades ago. “The Basque country was entering into a black hole” of cultural repression, he said, “and we had to do the maximum to pull it out.”

Some of ETA’s victims said they want more than apologies; they want him to face justice.

Since his long-awaited arrest last year, Urrutikoetxea has been on a campaign to shed the terrorist label and rebrand himself as a repentant, aging peacemaker.

ETA’s cause was politically and socially divisive inside the Basque society and widely rejected across the rest of Spain. It had some significant support among separatist-minded Basques, but many others were appalled by its tactics and silenced by the terror the group imposed.

Many Spaniards thought that ETA should have disbanded with the return of democracy to Spain after Franco’s death in 1975, not continue its violent assault on the state and its citizens. ETA assassinated politicians, policemen and judges but also ordinary people.