Roundup: Italy seizes 800 automatic weapons bound for N. Europe

Italian police on Thursday seized a shipment in the north-eastern port of Trieste carrying some 800 automatic weapons heading from Turkey to various northern European countries, local media reported.

Separately, an Italian court confirmed the arrest of 10 alleged radicals who were among 17 people targeted by a joint-terror operation with other European forces earlier this month.

The load of weapons consisted in 781 Winchester SXP shotguns and 66 Winchester SXP rifles, each packed in individual boxes aboard a truck arrived on a ferry at the Trieste port on Tuesday, Ansa news agency said.

The truck was driven by a Turkish citizen, and bound for Germany, Holland, and Belgium, according to financial police and port authorities in Trieste.

No custom rules were violated, but the shipment had not been properly declared to port authorities under arms trafficking laws, and was found without the license needed to transport such weapons, authorities added.

"There was a risk that it would end up into wrong hands," the financial police told reporters.

The seizure was ordered by prosecutors in Trieste, but it was not immediately clear if there was any link with counterterrorism investigations.

However, police said the operation was carried out after security inspections had been "substantially increased" at Italy's borders in the wake of Nov. 13 Paris attacks and the following terror alert in Belgium.

Meanwhile, a court in the northern city of Trento confirmed the charges against 10 alleged radicals, who had been arrested on Nov. 12 on suspicion of international terrorism.

Overall, some 16 Iraqi Kurds and 1 citizen from Kosovo had been targeted by arrest warrants in the operation ordered by prosecutors in Rome in cooperation with several European police forces.

The group was believed to focus on recruiting militants in Italy and other European countries, and helping them join radical forces in Syria and Iraq, the police said.

Seven of the 17 people targeted were later released for lack of evidence, according to local media reports.

Italian authorities also renewed their commitment to fighting terrorism alongside France and other international allies on Thursday.

Prime Minister Matteo Renzi paid a visit to French President Francois Holland, and declared that "a broader coalition was needed to destroy the Islamic State group and the dreadful project it represents."

Renzi stressed Europe would also need to provide a "cultural response" to the terrorism threat, and pledged some 500 million euros (530 million U.S. dollars) to invest in impoverished suburbs of the Italian cities.

"(With the Paris attacks) they tried to hit France and the whole Europe at the heart, in our identity and culture," the Italian prime minister said in Paris. "We feel engaged on this respect, as much as we are at a diplomatic and military level, to prove that we are stronger than their barbarity."

Also on Thursday, Italy's Interior Minister Angelino Alfano said a plan for the Syrian post-conflict was needed in order to avoid the anarchy that occurred in Libya after the 2011 civil war that ousted Muammar Gaddafi.

"The scars (in Libya) are still open," Alfano said in Rome. "We still have to see if Syria will become a "second Libya", or if there will be a framework and a clear plan for the aftermath".

Italian Justice Minister Andrea Orlando warned the terror threat faced by the European Union (EU) would require a new level of judicial coordination.

"We need a common European anti-terror prosecution office," Orlando said at the side of a security meeting on the upcoming Jubilee year in Rome. "Italy will keep pushing for it, even though we are still in a minority."

Italy would allocate 150 million euros (159 million U.S. dollars) on strengthening its technology systems for counter-terrorism, Orlando added. Endit