Donostia-San Sebastián International Peace Conference announced "definitive cessation of its armed activity". They said they were ending their 43-year armed campaign for independence and called on Spain and France to open talks. The Spanish government insisted that it will not negotiate on demands for Basque self-determination until ETA disbands. Spanish prime minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero described ETA's announcement as "a victory for democracy, law and reason". Donostia-San Sebastián International Peace Conference The International Conference to Promote the Resolution of the Conflict in the Basque Country — more widely known as the Donostia-San Sebastián International Peace Conference — was a conference aimed at promoting a
Cristina Garmendia innovation. On April 11, 2008 the president of the Spanish Government, Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, elected Cristina Garmendia as holder of a new ministry, Minister of Science and Innovation, which was going to be created during the IX term of office. The Ministry of Science and Innovation for the first time drew together all the Government’s capacities and bodies to promote R&D, including Public Research Bodies, the Instituto de Salud Carlos III and the Centro para el Desarrollo Tecnológico Industrial (CDTI). The Ministry was created with the mandate to fully harness the economic potential the scientific capacity of the country