2009-06-11
Rome - Italian police on Thursday morning arrested six suspected members of a leftist terrorist cell who were allegedly planning attacks, including one targeting a Group of Eight (G8) summit, according to the news agency ANSA and other media reports. Among the six taken into custody, is a man who in the past was investigated on suspicion of providing support to the Red Brigades, the extreme-left wing terrorist group that caused much bloodshed in Italy in the 1970s and 1980s, the reports said.
The arrests, which were carried out in several Italian regions, including Sardinia, stemmed from material gathered by investigators by wire-tapping conversations involving the suspects.
The group had allegedly planned an attack against a July 2009 G8 summit originally scheduled to take place at La Maddalena, a tiny island off Sardinia.
In May the Italian government switched the summit venue to L'Aquila in a show of solidarity after the city was devastated in an earthquake.