99% CERTAIN

ISLAMIC terrorists ARE behind the rail bomb massacre in Madrid, it was claimed last night.

Spanish intelligence chiefs are "99 per cent" sure radical Muslims linked to al-Qaeda are responsible for the terror attacks that killed 200.

Evidence gathered by Spain's National Intelligence Centre suggests 10 to 15 terrorists planted the bombs on the four trains and then fled.

The claims, made on a private Spanish radio station last night, contradict government statements that Basque separatist group ETA are to blame.

A source said: "This will trigger further outrage and fear in Madrid and underline the threat of al-Qaeda for the rest of the Western world."

And police said last night that CCTV footage which captured three men disguised in ski masks fleeing a stolen van at a train station car park could prove vital in cracking the case.

The van contained seven detonators, jellied dynamite and audiotapes of the Holy Koran. It did not have the false number plates ETA usually attaches to its stolen vehicles.

Spanish Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar and his conservative government, facing an election today, were yesterday still insisting the Basque separatists ETA were responsible.

But in calls to a separatist newspaper and to Basque regional television, ETA have denied any involvement.

Private radio station SER, whose owners have links to the opposition Socialist Party, reported that the National Intelligence Centre (CNI) had evidence pointing to an Islamic group.

The radio quoted a source as saying: "The evidence has wiped out previous indications that led us to believe in ETA."

And a Spanish intelligence officer told the radio station: "We are 99 per cent certain this was the work of radical Muslims."

Authorities were following up other lines of inquiry after a group linked to Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda network claimed responsibility in a letter to a British Arabic newspaper.

Meanwhile, tens of thousands of mourners were attending funerals yesterday amid desperately traumatic scenes.

Among them, 11-year-old schoolboy Marcus Gonzalez was pictured standing with his head bowed over his father's coffin, wiping tears from his eyes.

Some 60 flag-draped coffins showered in flowers filled the tiny chapels inside Madrid's main funeral parlour.

Some mourners wept hysterically, others stood silent and sombre, lost for words. As one funeral ended, another began. Elsewhere, hearses were tailed by convoys of cars to other overflowing cemeteries and crematoria.

One victim, a seven-month-old Polish child called Patricia, became the 199th in the death toll on Friday night.

And last night her mother, cleaner Yolanda Razacta, 38, was on a life support machine. Her builder father Wieslow, 34, died on arrival at Madrid's Baby Jesus Hospital.

Her aunt Kati, 27, said: "Words are not enough to describe the loss. They brought Patricia to Spain for a better future. They all felt very Spanish."

She said her sister Yolanda and Wieslow were on their way into central Madrid to go to work, planning to drop baby Patricia off at a friend's house.

A teenage boy's death in hospital brought the toll to 200 as the search went on to hunt down the murderers behind the 10-bomb rail blast at Atocha station on Thursday.

The full horror hit home as children such as Marcus Gonzalez sobbed. He was comforted by his mother Maria Jose Salazar during his father Air Force Lieutenant Felix Gonzalez's funeral service in a gymnasium at Alcala de Henares, just outside the capital.

A fellow mourner said: "He kept crying, 'Why?...why?' He just doesn't understand why anyone would want to kill his father."

Alcala de Henares, home to 40 of the dead, was the starting point for three of the four doomed trains. Yesterday 800 crammed into a sports centre to pay their respects.

"We have buried a son, 23 years old, a son full of future," said one father, dressed all in black, his arm around his wife. "We are overwhelmed." Another victim, electrical engineer 22-year-old Jorge Casanova, was a David Beckham fan and will be buried in a Real Madrid football shirt. Brother Javier, 29, said: "He loved Beckham and Zidane."

Of the 1,500 injured, 288 were still in hospital, 17 of them critical and 40 described as "grave". Several Brits were hurt, but none had life-theatening injuries, said the British Foreign Office.

Yesterday a chilling recording of one of the injured calling a friend's voicemail gave a disturbing insight into the tragedy.

The woman, who somehow escaped alive, left the 12-second-long message as explosions began to rip through the carriages.

She screamed: "I'm in Atocha. There's a bomb on the train! We had to..." Two more ear-piercing blasts are heard. And then the line goes dead.

Copyright 2004 MGN LTD
Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning Company. All rights Reserved.