French police have arrested the suspected leader of Basque separatist rebels ETA in a major blow to the guerrilla group and its bombing campaign in Spain, Spanish officials said yesterday.

Francisco Javier Lopez Pena, who had been on the run for more than 20 years and was also known as Thierry, was arrested together with three other suspected ETA leaders in the southwestern French city of Bordeaux late on Tuesday.

Lopez Pena and the other three - Jon Salaberria, Igor Suberbiola and Ainhoa Ozaeta - did not resist arrest, French police said. Television showed them shouting separatist slogans in the Basque language as they were bundled into police cars.