MONDRAGON, Spain, March 7, 2008 (AFP) - Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero met with the family of a former politician who was shot and killed Friday in an attack blamed on the Basque separatist group ETA.

He spent about one hour with the widow, mother and three children of Isaias Carrasco, who was killed outside his home hours earlier, a local Socialist Party official said.

Accompanied by Interior Minister Alfredo Perez Rubalcaba, the prime minister also later met with local politicians.

'If they (ETA) think that in this way they will weaken democracy and that the Socialist Party will recoil, then they are mistaken,' Zapatero said.

Conservative opposition leader Mariano Rajoy also traveled to Mondragon to give his condolences to the family.

Zapatero and Rajoy earlier decided jointly to call off the campaign for Sunday's elections after the killing.

Zapatero, tipped to win a second mandate in Sunday's vote, earlier accused ETA of seeking to interfere in the electoral process with the killing.