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BORDEAUX, France : French police on Saturday arrested two men and a woman suspected of being key members of the outlawed Basque separatist group ETA.
Asier Borrero, Itziar Plaza and Iurgi Garitagoitia -- all of whom figure on the Spanish Civil Guard's list of wanted ETA figures -- were picked up for driving a stolen vehicle near the southern French city of Pau.
A French judicial source described the arrests as "fortuitous", explaining that the suspects had been in a fast-food restaurant when "their suspicious behaviour... caught the attention of a police officer.
"Police carried out checks on their vehicle and found it to be stolen," the source added.
Spanish authorities in Madrid confirmed that Borrero, Plaza and Garitagoitia were considered key ETA figures.
They are "believed to have an important role at the heart of the military apparatus of the ETA terrorist organisation," said a statement from the Spanish interior ministry.
Three revolvers were seized during the arrests along with computer hardware and false papers, the ministry said.
Spanish media reported that Borrero, 24, was suspected of involvement in a gun battle with French police in Lozere in southern France at the beginning of June in which a policeman was injured.
He is also suspected of carrying out bomb attacks in northern Spain and in the Basque Country.
Spanish police believe Iurgi Garitagoitia Salegui led an ETA commando unit operating in the Basque province of Guipuzcoa in 2008 and which is blamed for the killing last December of Basque businessman Ignacio Uria.
The woman arrested, Plaza, is believed to have been part of another ETA commando unit and is suspected of involvement in some 30 attacks.
All three were detained on Saturday in Bayonne awaiting their probable transfer to Paris, police said.
ETA, considered a terrorist organisation by the European Union and the United States, is blamed for the deaths of 825 people in its 40-year campaign to carve a Basque homeland out of northern Spain and southwestern France.
- AFP /ls
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