Ex-member of Basque group ETA sentenced to 85 years in jail over Madrid car bomb attack

MADRID (Reuters) - Spain's High Court has sentenced a former member of the defunct Basque separatist group ETA to 85 years in prison for her involvement in a car bomb attack in Madrid that left 11 people injured 24 years ago, the court said on Tuesday.

The court found Ana Belen Egues guilty of placing and detonating a dynamite charge in a stolen vehicle in the north of the Spanish capital on Aug. 8, 2000.

"The explosion...affected a large number of people, seriously disrupting their day-to-day activities," the ruling said.

The court, which handles all terrorism-related cases in Spain, handed Egues a 15-year sentence for the crime of terrorist damage and 70 years on seven counts of attempted homicide.

Out of the 11 people injured in the explosion, seven were left in serious condition.

Egues, 55, was already serving a 30-year jail sentence for another bombing in November 2001 that injured 97 people and killed a senior police official, as well as a 126-year sentence for taking part in the assassination of an army officer in January 2000.

She was arrested shortly after the 2001 attack.

In 2018, ETA (Euzkadi Ta Azkatasuna, or Basque Homeland and Liberty) announced it had completely dismantled all its structures, ending a 50-year guerrilla campaign against the Spanish state in which it killed 853 people, according to government figures.

(Reporting by David Latona; Editing by Angus MacSwan)