MADRID, March 7: Spain’s main political parties cancelled closing campaign rallies on Friday, two days before an election, after a former councillor from the governing Socialist Party was shot and killed in the Basque Country.

The government immediately blamed ETA separatists for the killing of Isaias Carrasco, who was shot several times in front of his wife and young daughter outside his house in the town of Mondragon.

Whether Carrasco’s murder would have any effect on the outcome of Sunday’s election, in which the Socialists are favourites, was not immediately clear.

Both the Socialist Party and the opposition Popular Party cancelled rallies scheduled for Friday, the last day campaigning is allowed.

“This is a vile, cowardly act worthy of all our condemnation, carried out by a group of murderers who will never succeed in breaking the will of Spanish democracy,” Interior Minister Alfredo Rubalcaba told reporters, blaming the ETA Basque separatist group.

Socialist Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, who broke off peace talks with ETA in December 2006 after they killed two people with a car bomb, leads the conservative Popular Party in opinion polls.

Zapatero became prime minister as a result of a surprise election victory following another terror attack in 2004, when Islamist extremists killed 191 people by bombing Madrid trains.

He has led a crackdown on ETA, but the Popular Party has accused him of being soft on the Basque separatists in the past.

“This is a day of mourning. We should all stand by the family of Isaias Carrasco and remain united, united against ETA,” said Popular Party candidate Mariano Rajoy.—Reuters