Spain says ETA bomb warning was false alarm

MADRID, Mar 15 (Reuters) A call warning that Basque separatist group ETA had planted three bombs in northern Spain was a hoax, the regional government said today.

The government earlier said somebody had called the emergency services in the Navarre region in the name of ETA at about 1263 hrs (IST) warning there were bombs on two motorways and in a court building in regional capital Pamplona.

The court was briefly evacuated and the roads checked.

''Given the characteristics of the call, (the threat) did not seem real but we followed procedure and checked it out,'' a regional government spokesman said.

ETA has detonated a series of small bombs in recent months, usually preceded by telephone warnings so that police had time to clear the areas and avoid injuries.

Last Thursday, ETA planted five small bombs in the Basque Country, coinciding with a strike called by Batasuna, a political party banned for its links with ETA.

ETA has killed 850 people since 1968 in its fight to carve out an independent Basque state straddling northern Spain and southwestern France.

The group, branded a terrorist group by the European Union and United States, has not killed anybody since 2003.

Reuters HS BD1649