Good summary, though I would add to this:

The Popular Party believes he has ties to Alvaro Cuesta, the Socialist spokesman on the 3/11 commission, and Gaspar Llamazares, the head of the Communist Party, both of whom are said to manage his mining business while he is away on business trips in Brazil.

Those two were opposed to Huarte giving evidence at said commission. Again, perhaps there's a good explanation. But it sure looks like CYA of some shape or form.

There are a few more things I'd like to know:

• What are/were Huarte's opinions of ETA?

• Did the explosives come from Huarte's mine?

• The meetings between Huarte and Benesmail were recorded. From this, I gather that they were played to the 3/11 commission. Any Spanish readers (or those knowledgeable of Spanish politics) aware of transcripts?

Oh, and what happened to these guys?

Francisco Javier Lavandera, a former police agent under a witness protection program until a few days ago, claimed that Antonio Toro and Suárez Trashorras, charged with providing the explosives used in the March 11 bombings, "behaved calmly as if they were supported by someone very powerful".

Could a Spanish reader translate this? It looks like it connects Huarte to another 3/11-linked jihadi.

Two nights ago I was doing a Google search on Huarte and Venezuela trying to figure out if there was any public record of explicit or implicit support on his part of the Spanish arms sales to the Chavez regime as reported by Robin Burk and others. I had no luck. Perhaps in part to my nonexistent Spanish language skills. But I did find two news items related to Huarte that I don't see reported above that maybe you'd want to comment on.
The first concerns rumors, and I never read anything to suggest they were more than rumors, that Huarte was involved in organizing human shields in Iraq prior to the war. (Full Disclosure: I have to rely in part on Googles Spanish to English translations)
The second item revolves around what did Huarte know about 3/11 and when did he know it? In an opinion piece by Federico Quevedo, it is alleged that the PSOE, presumably in the person of Huarte, had or came into possession of information between March 11 and March 14 that it was not the ETA that was behind the attacks but instead Islamic terrorists - and he did not share this information with the security services or the Ministry of the Interior. Quevedo does not allege that Huarte or anybody in the PSOE was responsible for facilitating 3/11. The question is one of political spin in the context of the election immediately after the attack. What's alleged is that Anzar and his party the PP was allowed to coninue to insist on the involvement of ETA when there was intelligence available that would have pointed elsewhere. And as we know public anger over an alleged conver-up by Anzar as to the role of Islamists in the attack led to his ouster - amongst other factors.

I'm going to provide a link HERE to the original spanish language article I found in Google. I know someones language skills have to be better than the Google translator.

The first concerns rumors, and I never read anything to suggest they were more than rumors, that Huarte was involved in organizing human shields in Iraq prior to the war.

Do you have the link for that? The jump from thinking and doing, separating the many from the few, etc.

I didn't mention Toro and Trashorras because even if what Lavandera said is true that doesn't conclusively tie them back to Huarte. Ideally, you'd try to flip both of them (who are footnotes in the plot, as I understand it) and see whether or not they can be made to implicate Huarte. If they can, then the idea has legs but until then we're just speculating.

As for Huarte not tipping off the Interior Ministry, he seems to be described as an expert on the Islamic world, so it would make sense that he would be one of the experts to tell the Interior Ministry that this is the work of "Jihad International" (the term under which the Spanish classify al-Qaeda and its affiliate groups) rather than the ETA. The general fishiness of this thing seems to come about in that he didn't seek out Benesmail after the attacks, when one would assume that a GIA source you'd been cultivating nearly than 2 years would be one of the first places you'd go after the attacks, etc.

Ok, point taken. Rumor. Singular. It took me a while to dredge it up off of Google. Here is the translated version. I can't seem to call up the original Spanish for some reason. The site is Digital Peace. (Paz Digital). Looking at the article it seems at first that the term human shield is first being used as a metaphor for some other activity. But then in the fourth paragraph it makes specific mention of the same "rumors" but I have yet to find a secondary source for their origin.

I didn't mention Toro and Trashorras because even if what Lavandera said is true that doesn't conclusively tie them back to Huarte. Ideally, you'd try to flip both of them (who are footnotes in the plot, as I understand it) and see whether or not they can be made to implicate Huarte. If they can, then the idea has legs but until then we're just speculating.

I doubt it'd be that easy. I can't imagine Huarte is that stupid. But he might be, so...

A man accused of involvement with those two men says a police officer was in on the sale to A-Q. It isn't clear how senior, but I can't picture a police chief getting together with a former coal miner to sell dynamite. So let's assume its a low-ranking cop. Does anyone really figure having a P.C. in on it will spare you any grief? No. So why were they so non-chalant?

Thanks, JD. Interestingly, a PP politician alleges Huarte knew Toro and Trashorras.

Colt,
here you have the headings of some articles about this very, very, dirty, scary and bloody tragedy in the same digital spanish paper where is the article you want the translation (english versions in www.spainherald.com). If the one you want is nos translated soon there I will try to
do my best to give you mine.

Dan,
you did a very well summary about it. Also I agree with you that we must take a lot of care with conspiracy theories, but what is around (and under, and covered) the 11-M in Madrid smells really bad.

THE SPAIN HERALD

Wednesday, March 23, 2005
March 11 suspect collected funds for terrorists while PSOE member
Mouhannad Almallah Dabas, a member of the Socialist Party until last Friday and a suspect in the March 11, 2004...

Monday, March 21, 2005
March 11 terrorist joined Socialist Party in May 2004
Syrian Mohannad Almallah Dabas was arrested last Friday for the second time regarding his connections with the conspiracy behind the March...

Tuesday, March 29, 2005
Rajoy demands Socialists explain Huarte and Almallah
...doing. It is not normal for the PSOE to have a member who is a terrorist." Meanwhile, José Blanco said yesterday, "There...

Tuesday, March 22, 2005
PP demands Socialists testify before March 11 commission
The PP demanded yesterday that several PSOE leaders, including organizational secretary José Blanco, Gijon local secretary José Manuel Sariego, and a neighborhood...

Monday, March 21, 2005
A Rotten Stench
By Editorial
There are a lot of loose ends, too many questions and an intense rotting smell that is starting to overwhelm...

Wednesday, April 06, 2005
PSOE: Witnesses no, FAES video yes for March 11 commission
...how alleged Syrian terrorist Mouhannad Almallah, implicated in the bombings, became a PSOE member. The PP wanted Sariego to testify about...

More regarding the interval between 3/11 and 3/14: Here is a LINK to a Liberta Digital article. It confirms there are indeed serious official inquiries into what Huarte knew at that time and who he was talking to (or not). The headline is: "The PP Requests The list of telephone calls of Huarte between the 11 and the 14 of March." See also related article about the refusal of the PSOE to put Huarte before the 3/11 inquiry to testify. And more! There were tapes of conversations between Huarte and Benesmail in jail that have been erased!

JD (#4):

I combined my woeful Spanish with Google to translate Quevado's opinion piece into colloquial English. Phrases I'm unsure of are marked [?].

“Two Words” column of 23/3/05, by Federico Quevado
Why doesn’t the Popular Party say what they know? “From March 11 to March 14, the Socialist Party had information that they used against us”

Unless I missed it, and the Counsel of Ministers have implemented a reform of the National Intelligence Center (CNI), it doesn’t seem that these services represent Spanish intelligence. In other words, our spies seem to be precisely an ONG [?]. If this is not the case, and Mr. Fernando Huarte, outstanding Asturian socialist militant and paid agent of the CNI, did not travel to Villabona Prison to visit Abdelkrim Benesmail out of purely philanthopic motives, but in order to obtain information, then the Socialists (PSOE) are lying when they claim otherwise. And the information that Benesmail passed to Huarte must have been very important indeed, since, for example, some of Benesmail’s excursions out of the prison for dental work took place during times of heightened security measures.

A year after the brutal attacks of 3-11, we know why the PSOE wants to bring the Commission of Investigation to a close without having it consider one of the most interesting series of events: what happened between the 11th and the 14th of March, 2004.

Contrary to the implications of yesterday’s piece by fellow reporter Antonio Casado, I don’t think that anybody supposes that the PSOE is implicated in the attacks themselves. “That is a barbaric accusation,” one of the Popular Party (PP) leaders told me yesterday, adding that “we must avoid pointing our fingers in that direction.” There is just no reason to go there. But it is still telling that the PP doesn’t dare declare, loudly and clearly, what the truth of the events of those days really is.

Here’s what they should be saying: "From the 11th to the 14th of March, the PSOE had information in its possesion that it used against us, instead of passing it to the security services and the Department of the Interior." In particular, the PSOE knew, almost from the moment of the attack, from very-well-informed sources, that the perpetrators of this bloodshed were not members of the ETA terror organization, but were, instead, members of a radical Islamist cell.

It wasn’t until the last minute [before the election] that the PP found out what had happened. That months-old statement by [PP spokesman Eduardo] Zaplana that "we had the sensation that somebody played with us," seems to lack the force of evidence today. I remember the statement by that great [embaucador—evil spirit?] [PSOE Secretary] Jose Blanco, that whoever wanted to investigate what transpired between the 11th and the 14th of March was "only looking for confusion and noise." And later, it was a travesty of the slow news days of summer [?] when [PSOE strategist Alfredo Pérez] Rubalcaba confirmed that there was nothing further to investigate. He knew very well why he said that.

This makes the PP almost an after-the-fact accomplice in hiding what is almost certain, namely, that that the PSOE deliberately hid information from the Government so that it would continue to believe that ETA was responsible for the attack. The PSOE knew full well that, at some point, the role of Islamist terrorism would become clear, and that things would play out much as they did. This, by the way, does not reduce by even one degree the responsibility that rests with [then Prime Minister] Aznar for not doing, during those days, all that needed to be done.

Yesterday morning, [PP Secretary Mariano] Rajoy spoke with Aznar by telephone, and the ex-prime minister was forceful in affirming that he knew “nothing” of Huarte’s involvement with the CNI and with the Islamist cell. I have been able to confirm that Jorge Dezcallar, the director of CNI at the time of the attack, did not know of Huarte’s involvement, or of his visits to Benesmail, or, of course, of Huarte’s contractual relationship with CNI since 1992.

Huarte was recruited to Spain’s espionage service, according to yesterday’s [newspaper] El Mundo, the PSOE being powerful enough [?], and the reason was its strong association with the Islamic world through the “Al Fatah” organization for aiding the Palestinians—an organizaton whose name already says what there is to say. And there are indications that the enlistment by Huarte with the CNI was well-known by more than one PSOE member. Yesterday, [PP spokesman] Zaplana recalled Jose Blanco’s statement on March 12th that "we have more suspicions that information is not being made public," although neither Zaplana himself nor [PP Secretary Angel] Acebes understood at that time what Blanco was referring to.

Who lied? That is the big question, although already there are sufficient data for coming up with an answer. Why did they lie? In order to win the [parliamentary] elections. I do not know if we will get to know what is behind all this, or if some had relevant information prior to the attack, with all the culpability that that would involve. I want to think that this could not be the case, although at this point there are few revelations about this story that could cause us genuine surprise.

On the anniversary of 3-11, I wrote that [PSOE leader] Zapatero had achieved his victory by falsely stating that the [PS] Government had lied. I simply thought it was false that that Government had wanted to deceive public opinion, and had tried to do so by hiding information that it did not posess. Now it is evident that others did have crucial information, and hid it, knowing how its release would have affected the electoral results. Of itself, that may not delegitimize the election of March 2004, but the story of information withheld for electoral benefit should come out. And it is the PP’s obligation to say what it knows, so that the citizenry can know it as well.

Thanks, Whig. I've been reading the Spain Herald, but this hasn't been translated yet. If you could translate it, I'd really appreciate it.

Sorry men, I was working. Let's clarify rapidly some points:

ONG - Non Government Organization, (NGO) here used relating to a charitable organization in opposition to a defence-military one, as it should be.

embaucador - swindler, cheater

the PSOE being powerful enough [?] - wrong translation, it is: Huarte was recruited being the PSOE in office (in power - in office, as said in Spanish)

Huarte has a business related to mining, but not a mine. Toro and Trashorras knew Benesmail and, I think, other Islamic extremists in jail. The Explosives Plot does not point directly towards Huarte, AFAIK.

Colt,
I will translate the article the best I can this weekend. Since is to long to post it in a comment perhaps it would be better if I send it to the email of Eurabiantimes.com.

Please do. I'll post it on the website once you've sent it to me. Thanks very much.

According to Madrid's El Mundo on March 28 (direct link, but reprinted here with free reg req), Huarte and his wife were also the owners of a small company called Huarte Spain International, specialized in providing trading services from Spain to countries like Lybia, Iran, Iraq, Lebanon, Syria, Palestine, Algeria and Pakistan.

The company had hardly any officially declared turnover (15,000 euros in 2003 approx). It's located in a small nondescript building in Gijón (Asturias). When the El Mundo reporter visited the site, he found only two Peruvian employees scared to death. Now get this: they say Huarte or anyone else had been in the office for a year and a half. All computers were removed from there right before the Iraq war started.

they say Huarte or anyone else had been in the office for a year and a half

Sorry, I meant "they say Huarte or anyone else had not been in the office for a year and a half"

I've been reading all the posts, and leaving aside some details, I think you got it. You know the facts about Huarte (not many non-Spaniards outside the foreign offices do), now the problem might come from putting them into a context to fully understand them, but so far it is a good job indeed.

Let's see more details:

Colt (#1)

What are/were Huarte's opinions of ETA?

Very good question. That probably holds the key to understand Continental European politics.

Let's see the way a Socialist worker in a public heavy industry, such as Izar, thinks about politics. For him, the government, the owner, has to keep paying his salary even though the company cannot generate profits year after year, which is a privilege over the rest of the workers employed in private ones. If the government threatens no to do so, they go on a violent strike, they stop the traffic in the highways and confront the riot-policemen.

For ETA, the government has to grant them some political weight in the Basque land (ETA does not ask directly for independence, but for the right of secession), that is, they want to get using weapons what they won't get in regional elections. During many years their targets were only policemen and their families, soldiers or businessmen. Only when the PP began to mention individual rights and freedoms ETA targeted politicians and reporters, the representatives of the political freedom and the freedom of speech, in a regular basis. ETA is fascism in a pure state.

So they both ask for privileges above the majority of people. For both of them the government in Madrid does not represent the will of the Spaniards but something that when you kick their personel (policemen and the like) it concedes you privileges. Of course, the difference between them is important, but just a matter of degree, a Socialist public heavy industry worker may hurt a policeman but not kill him. Thus an ETA terrorist and a deep Socialist see politics from the same point of view, but the radical Socialist stops before severely harming anyone.

I see it on my most Socialist friends, they understand ETA's aim and agree, but they disagree in the means they use.

Also don't forget that Huarte in his youth was a member (as many other Socialists) of Falange, the fascist party during Franco dictatorship.

Did the explosives come from Huarte's mine?

AFAIK Huarte has a heavy mining machinery business, not a mine. It seems that the dynamite was stolen by Toro's brother in Law, Emilio Suárez from a private-owned clay mine called "La Conchita".

The meetings between Huarte and Benesmail were recorded. From this, I gather that they were played to the 3/11 commission. Any Spanish readers (or those knowledgeable of Spanish politics) aware of transcripts?

The Socialist government hand in a transcription of those recordings, it stops when Benesmail and Huarte begin to talk about the relation between ETA and Islamic Extremists. A summary, in which is said there is none, is inserted instead. See this.

Finally, Huarte was probably a collaborator, an external consultant, not a member, of the Spanish Secret Services (the NGO called CNI, as Quevedo sarcasticaly says). The Socialist government may want to increase the importance of his post in order to cover his activities under the Official Secrets Act.

#17 Franco Aleman

Wow. That's dodgy.

All computers were removed from there right before the Iraq war started.

I don't usually believe in coincidences.

#19 Joe A

That's all interesting. Thanks.

A summary: three threads link Huarte with the perpetrators of 3/11

- His meetings with Benesmail in jail. Benesmail was arrested being part of a terrorist cell whose leader was Lamari. Lamari died in Leganés with other six suspected members of the 3/11 plot, when they blew up their apartment as the Police was going to storm it.

- The support Yusuf Galán claimed he received from Huarte's Islamist association, Yusuf Galán himself founded his own association, Ibn Taymiyyah, in Asturias, although he comes from Madrid. Galán was a recruiter in charge of sending new extremists to be trained in Afganistan or Indonesia. According to the investigations, Galán and Moutaz Almallah had lived in the same apartment a long period of time. That apartment was used then, and later by his brother Mouhannad Almallah, for recruiting terrorits and, just after 3/11, to hide two perpetrators. Mouhannad Almallah, a Syrian born Spanish citizen was a member of the Spanish Socialist Party.

- Finally, Rabia Gaya, Huarte's aide for, among other issues, the security in the Socialist Acts in Gijón. Gaya met Fouad el Morabit on March 27th 2003, one year before the attacks, according to El Mundo printed edition. El Morabit knew El Tunecino and El Egipcio, two Islamic extremists formerly accused of being the masterminders of 3/11 before the relationship between Benesmail and Huarte came into the light, and also knew Mouhannad Almallah. He is jail on charges related to the terrorist attack.

Over here via Eurabian Times, Whig has translated an article that seems to connect Huarte to Galan, Almallah and another plotter named el Morabit.

Joe A (#s 14, 19, 21):

Thanks for repairing my translation (#12); that was at the very limits of limited conversational Spanish. Your backgrounders are fantastic; it's a privilege to see such careful detail set down in English.

Insightful posts by Colt and others here too; kudos all round.