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12/14/2004:

"Aznar 'wiped files on Madrid bombings'"

All computer records in PM's office destroyed, says Zapatero

Spain's former prime minister José María Aznar wiped all computer records at his office referring to the March 11 Madrid train bombings and the rest of his period of government, his successor José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero said yesterday.
Mr Zapatero told a parliamentary commission on the bombings that he had no idea whether records were made of crisis meetings held at the prime minister's office after the attacks that killed 191 people, as computer hard-drives and security copies were wiped clean.

"There was nothing, absolutely nothing... everything had been wiped," Mr Zapatero told a raucous session of the parliamentary commission. "There is nothing from March 11 to March 14 in the prime minister's office."

Mr Zapatero, whose Socialists won a surprise election victory three days after the bombings, said the incoming government had been left the bill for the erasing.


The newspaper El País reported yesterday that the job cost €12,000 (£8,200) and included erasing all email records.

The only records handed to the incoming government were paper documents, the newspaper reported.

Mr Zapatero accused Mr Aznar's conservative People's party government of having tried to fool Spaniards into believing the armed Basque group Eta, not radical Islamists, carried out the attacks. "It was massive deceit," he said.
Full Article: guardian.co.uk