There are further indications of a likely peace offer from the Basque separatist group ETA, just months after a ceasefire announcement.

The leader of the group’s banned political wing, Arnaldo Otegi, has told The Wall Street Journal that ETA is “ready to give up violence and pursue a peaceful strategy to create an independent Basque state”.

His comments from jail come just before an expected statement from ETA on its future strategy.

However, the government is sceptical in its response.

Spanish Deputy Prime Minister Alfredo Perez Rubalcaba said: “One must take into account that decade of serious incidents, many assassinations, for example, which do not come to a close with two or three declarations. It would be better to move on from a phase of declarations to the real one, which is to disband, and substitute the letters E – T – A with the letters E – N – D.”

ETA declared its latest ceasefire in September. But these have been broken in the past, leaving authorities wary of such announcements.

The group has killed more than 850 people in half a century of armed struggle.

Its latest attack on Spanish soil was in August last year.

But the group has been weakened by numerous police crackdowns.

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