Italian police on Tuesday seized a shipment of assault rifles heading from the Italian mainland to criminal gangs in Sardinia.
Two Kalashnikovs, a US-made Garrand semi-automatic and a Czech-made Skorpio machine gun were among the weapons found on a truck belonging to a central Sardinian company.
Carabinieri squads are digging up a sheep pen where they believe a substantial arms cache has been built up by gangs operating in and around the north-central Sardinian city of Nuoro.
Seventeen people have been detained in Sardinia and the northern Italian cities of Milan, Modena and Reggio Emilia.