Blockade

Rajoy, who won a landslide election victory a year ago, is wrestling with the second-largest budget deficit in the euro region while trying to revive the economy from a five-year slump that pushed the jobless rate to 26 percent. He is trying to avoid following Portugal, Greece and Ireland into seeking a sovereign bailout as Spaniards resist the measures being implemented as a condition for the 100 billion-euro European bank rescue he agreed to in June.

Left, Basque police intervene as picketers try to prevent buses from leaving a depot in Bilbao, Spain.