It was the Spanish Guardia Civil who alerted the French authorities. According to our colleagues from BFMTV, four people were arrested last Tuesday, in Seine-et-Marne, after the discovery of a veritable arsenal of weapons and ammunition.
In the homes searched, the gendarmes came across a pistol, offered to Niceto Alcalá-Zamora, who was the first president of the second Spanish Republic in 1932, they report on Facebook.
Exiled to France at the start of the Spanish Civil War
Last June, the Spanish authorities warned their French counterparts: a collector’s weapon, belonging to the country, is likely to be found in France and illegally held by a man residing in the Ile-de-France department.
After carrying out the investigation, the gendarmes launched an operation on Tuesday and searched the homes of four people, weapons collectors, hunters and frequenters of shooting ranges.
Also read In Spain, the dead of the civil war rise from the ground
At one of them, they discovered this famous Spanish firearm. But how did she end up in Seine-et-Marne? In 1936, four years after taking power, Niceto Alcalá-Zamora was forced to go into exile in France, where he lived until 1941, after the outbreak of the civil war.
A preliminary investigation opened
After this discovery, the Meaux public prosecutor’s office opened a preliminary investigation. At their homes, the police…
Read more on ParisMatch
France
