Police officers investigating a recent spate of robberies have arrested four members of a gang found to be in possession of a substantial quantity of explosives.
Searches carried out in properties in Torrevieja as part of a police operation, code-named, ‘Palmera’, have uncovered between 15 and 20 kilograms of Goma-2, a dynamite-type industrial high explosive manufactured in Spain for use chiefly in mining.Police are confident that the explosives were not destined to be used by terrorists. Although this kind of explosive has been previously used by ETA in terrorist attacks, police are satisfied that the four suspects have no links with terrorism, but are common criminals who planned to use the explosives to open bank safes and jewellers’ shops or in attacks on armoured security trucks.
Early evidence suggests that the gang, most of whom had previous police records, planned to sell some of the Goma-2 to other gangs and police investigators are now faced with the difficult task of identifying the source of the explosives, which may have been stolen from a local quarry. Alicante National Police said that they were able to positively identify members of the gang after coming across the explosives by chance, during the course of their investigations. Tomas Arenas, Security councillor for Torrevieja Town Council, stressed that such finds are rare and came as a surprise. Praising the National Police on the success of the operation, he appealed to residents to keep calm and assured them that the gang had not had the opportunity to use the explosives in the area.The four defendants, all Spanish (two men, aged 28 and 27 and two women, aged 24 and 23) have been remanded in custody.
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