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The cave is located in Deba, Gipuzkoa, in the part of the Basque Country that belongs to Spain. There has been continuous frictions between arahceologists and ecologists, who demand that the quarry is stopped, and the autonomous governments that is rather in favor of contuning with the explotation as much as possible, priorizing the economy over the archaeology.
"La cueva de Praileaitz y la cantera son compatibles", dice la Diputación. Diario Vasco - Feb-15-2007. ("Praileaitz cave and the quarry are compatible", says the provincial government). The article explains how they are blowing up stones at some 150 meters from the cave entrance - but not of the paintings hall. And that they "deny" that there has been any destruction fo the cave so far. It also mentions that several local political groups and associations have demanded the Basque Autonomous Government to declare the cave monument (believe it or not, it is not officialy so).
La cantera de Sasiola no puede actuar en la ladera de Praileaitz. Gara - Feb-27-2008. (Sasiola quarry cannot operate in the area of Praileaitz). Sounds to better news indeed but it was the Parliament which had to act, overriding the Government in this matter. Still, Miren Azkarate, speaker of the Basque Government, rejected to change her decree allowing the quarry to continue operating until there are more studies finished.
The second part of this last article, mentions a preliminary report by British scholar Paul Petit that confirms both the importance of the findings as well as their fragility. Backed with this report, Ms. Azkarate toyed in the press conference with the idea of forbidding not just the visists to the site but even archaeological excavations altogether that "could create dangerous air currents".
The article also mentions that the sismological studies are favorable, that the other 8 caves in the mountain are being studied and that so far none has yielded any archaeological remains.
Praileaitz means in Basque "rock of the monk" and the cave has been nicknamed as "the shaman's cave", because the initial research suggested it was used by possibly a single person, speculated to be some sort of shaman or medicine-person (or at least artist).
Naturzaleak: Los tesoros escondidos de Deba (The hidden treasuries of Deba). Generalistic article on the cave that goes in some more detail about the findings of the cave and its archaeological history (follow translated excerpts):
(...)
Without diminishing the importance of other nearby caves, Praileaitz is special because of its meaning and because of what has been found in it: it is believed that in this cave lived a single person, maybe a wise person or a shaman, to whom the rest of groups would visit to consult on matters of life or related to hunting. Also, in Praileaitz were found five necklaces dated to 15,500 ago, with as many as 29 hanging pieces made up with polished black stones that had been gathered at Deba river, not far from the site.
The cave (...) was discovered by Mikel Sasieta and Juan Arruabarrena in 1983. Later, since the year 2000, the Archaeology team of Aranzadi Scientific Society, lead by Xabier Peñalver, retook the excavations that culminated in 2005 wuth the discovery of the black stones.
(...) in this period and the level that most interests us of this cave, the Lower Magdalenian of some 15,500 years ago, we begin to see elements that are not anymore just related to survival. Human beings had in their heads more complex and elaborated ideas than just survival.
(...) all materials that appear in this layer are related apparently with ritual activity alone.
(...)
After gathering the stones, the only inhabitant of the cave decorated almost all of them. "Pierces them to make them able for hanging and appear those beads, grouped in necklaces in different places of the two rooms that we have excavated by the moment. We were lucky, also, because a stalagmitic layer had totally sealed the site, so it was totally virgin, absolutely untouched. It was perfectly preserved", recalls Peñalver. But, besides this, we also found several ochre pencils, that he/she used to pain him/herself and that showed he marks and faceting of having been used. "There are also more than 200 sea snails... All elements are, let's say, related with that activity that surely was of ritual type. We think that it would be a single person because at the entrance there is a bonfire, some bones of what that person ate and natural stone with a concavity where that person sat near the fire. This person could have some knowledge or special characteristics that made him the referent of all nearby caves. Possibly he/she was someone with knowledge maybe of medicine, maybe of hunting strategies, or knowledge of the area or something else that was asked by other inhabitants around", they say.
Praileaitz is totally different and absolutely unique if compared with other caves around. "It fulfills a different role. No other sites of this type are known, not just in our country but neither elsewhere - because, even if there are sites that have important ornaments, these appear mixed with, say, normal elements (...) Praileaitz gives the impressio of being more specialized [than Ekain], in the sense that it seems that all the activvity there realized was related with these rites", said Xabier Peñalver.
The excavations and the findings have been done in Praileaitz I. But there was also a Praileaitz II, now vanished and excavated by Eloisa Uribarri a decade ago.
Praileaitz II disapepared because of the work of the Sasiola quarry and it is precisely this industrial explotation which caused in some way that the research in Praileaitz I began. "Praileaitz II was at a higher altitude and now there is nothing there anymore. Praileaitz I is in that area too and that is why we began to excavate in the year 2000, because it was going to be affected by the quarry", explain from Aranzadi.
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Note sorry for any possible errors in the translation. And also it's a pity I could just find links in Spanish (or Basque).
(what's that: ten or ten thousand years?). 
"the protection of the enviromental context of the site".
