A huge weapons cache containing around 100 kilogrammes (220 pounds) of explosives and 200 detonators has been uncovered during a raid on a house belonging to the Red Brigades, the country's most feared extremist movement, Italian police said.

Italian police remove bags after they reportedly discovered a weapons cache in Rome allegedly belonging to the Red Brigades. Police say they found explosives, a detonator and two hand grenades hidden in a basement[AFP]

Documents and equipment described by investigators as of "major importance" were also discovered.

Investigating magistrates Franco Ionta and Pietro Saviotta said the raid was decisive blow to the Red Brigades, adding they estimated they had discovered all the equipment in their possession.

They told reporters the discovery would also have a psychological impact on the militants.

People living in the building were evacuated for a short time and a security cordon was set up covering a wide area as bomb disposal experts moved in.

The cache was discovered during a vast counter-terrorism operation launched in a popular neighbourhood in southeastern Rome on Saturday afternoon, police said.

Investigators had followed a trail to the house after acting on information gleaned from the arrest in October of eight alleged Red Brigades members in the northern city of Florence.

One of those detained, 44-year-old Marco Mezzasalma, is believed to have used the basement cache in Rome, police said.

Documents belonging to Nadia Desdemona Lioce, 43, were also found. Her arrest in March re-launched the inquiry into the murders of two Italian labour ministry officials Massimo D'Antona and Marco Biagi, who were killed respectively in Rome in 1999 and Bologna in 2002.

Responsibility for both crimes was claimed by the Red Brigades-Combatant Communist party, an offshoot of the Marxist group which carried out hundreds of attacks in the 1970s and 1980s.

Lioce, who had been on the run from the Italian authorities for years, was arrested on March 2 on a train after a routine identity check ended in a bloody shoot-out. Her travel companion Mario Galesi and a policeman both died in the incident.

Lioce admitted she belonged to the Red Brigades. Papers in the name of Mario Galesi were discovered in the house in Rome during the search on Saturday.

The house had been leased by an unnamed woman aged 35 who lived in the area and who has no previous criminal record, police said.

Officers from the Italian anti-terrorist unit also found two grenades, police and carabinieri uniforms, a small M12 machine gun, mobile telephones, computers and hard discs and equipment used to make false identity cards.

They discovered pamphlets claiming responsibility for several attacks, including the assassination of Marco Biagi, an economist and government consultant gunned down at his home in northern Bologna in March 2002.

The Red Brigades spread terror across Italy in the 1970s and 1980s with a string of bombings and assassinations.

The killing of two government advisers in 1999 and March 2002 sparked fears of a resurgence of attacks by the long-dormant group.

Some 140 of the original Red Brigades activists are still sought by Italy, many thought to be living in France.

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