Spanish police deactivate ETA bomb

MADRID (Reuters) - Spanish police on Sunday deactivated a small bomb in the Basque town of Getxo that was similar to devices used by Basque guerrilla group ETA, local government officials said.

Police found the bomb after emergency services received a call at around 0515 GMT alerting them that ETA had placed the bomb outside law courts in the town, the Basque local government said in a statement.

A bomb disposal unit deactivated the bomb which was left in a backpack outside the main entrance to the courts and contained 5 kg (11 lb) of explosives, a timer and detonator placed inside a cooking pot, officials said.

"It was of a type used by ETA," the local government said.

The bombing attempt follows a car bombing of a Basque Socialist politician's bodyguard in October.

A large car bomb placed by ETA failed to explode near a Defence Ministry office in the northern Spanish city of Logrono in September.

ETA and its supporters have been hit by a series of arrests in past weeks.

The group has vowed to keep up bomb attacks against the Spanish state, saying there is no point in negotiating with the Socialist government.

The government broke off an attempt at peace talks last year and ETA declared an end to a ceasefire in June.

Polls show most Basques do not want independence from Spain, the cause for which ETA has killed more than 800 people.

The group's four decades of armed struggle began in the last phases of the Franco dictatorship, when Basque culture and language were repressed.

(Reporting by Raquel Castillo; editing by Sami Aboudi)