Ares, the man from the Basque socialist apparatus

Rodolfo Ares, who died this Thursday, became publicly known towards the end of his political career, in 2009, when Patxi López, elected lehendakari, appointed him Interior Minister of the Basque Government, where he had to face the last blows of ETA in close contact with Alfredo Pérez Rubalcaba, head of the Interior of the Government of Rodríguez Zapatero.

He was a man of apparatus, discreet.

It is not remembered, for example, that he replaced Fernando Buesa as socialist spokesman in the Basque Parliament, when he was assassinated.

But, from the shadows, his history intersects with that of Basque socialism from the democratic beginnings to the end of terrorism.

His work at the head of the Ertzaintza left its mark on the end of terrorism.

It created a special unit made up of a large group of analysts at the local level in coordination with the State Security Forces, and promoted a policy of zero tolerance and the elimination of impunity for the ETA world in public spaces, agreed with the town halls.

They were very effective decisions at the end of terrorism, barely remembered.

By this time, Ares had come a long way in the PSE apparatus since it entered at the dawn of democracy.

In 1983 he was a councilor for the Bilbao City Council and later a Basque parliamentarian.

But he was, above all, a man of apparatus, before in 1997 he was recognized as Organization Secretary of the PSE until 2014.

His importance in the socialist apparatus was evident in the appointment of Nicolás Redondo Terreros as general secretary of the PSE in 1997, replacing Ramón Jáuregui, and he was decisive in the replacement of Redondo by Patxi López in 2005. Ares had worked with both in the apparatus.

But as a pragmatic politician, he understood that the stage of the end of terrorism was opening in the Basque Country, and he opted for López, in tune with the Zapatero government.

He supported the intelligent political bet of the dialogue with ETA to divide and isolate those who wanted to continue with terrorism that did not contradict the fight against terrorism.

It did not play an outstanding role in the dialogue process of the end of ETA.

But Patxi López and Rubalcaba had informed him and counted on him to participate in the socialist delegation, with Jesús Eguiguren and the lawyer Gómez Benítez, in the last meeting, held with ETA and Batasuna in Geneva in May 2007.

Ares was comfortable in the role of the necessary man in the shadows.

He was behind all the decisions of the PSE, from the small to the important ones.

He starred with López in the agreement with the Basque PP to oust Juan José Ibarretxe from the presidency of the Basque Government in 2009 for insisting on maintaining his sovereignist policy.

With Patxi López as lehendakari, in addition to directing the fight against terrorism from the Basque Country, he was behind the Vía Nanclares for reinsertion;

of memory policies and recognition of victims, for which he organized a congress.

He had the satisfaction of participating in the end of terrorism in 2011 and quietly left politics shortly thereafter.

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