On 28 June 2017, an arms theft at a military base in

Tancos Tancos is a Portuguese ''freguesia'' ("civil parish"), located in the municipality of Vila Nova da Barquinha. The population in 2011 was 243,9 mm caliber This is a list of firearm cartridges that have bullets in the to caliber range. *''Case length'' refers to the round case length. *''OAL'' refers to the overall length of the loaded round. All measurements are given in millimeters, followed ...

cartridges, 150

hand grenade A grenade is an explosive weapon typically thrown by hand (also called hand grenade), but can also refer to a shell (explosive projectile) shot from the muzzle of a rifle (as a rifle grenade) or a grenade launcher. A modern hand grenade genera ...

s, 44

anti-tank grenade An anti-tank grenade is a specialized hand-thrown grenade used to defeat armored targets. Although their inherently short range limits the usefulness of grenades, troops can lie in ambush or maneuver under cover to exploit the limited outward vis ...

s, 18

tear gas Tear gas, also known as a lachrymator agent or lachrymator (), sometimes colloquially known as "mace" after the early commercial aerosol, is a chemical weapon that stimulates the nerves of the lacrimal gland in the eye to produce tears. In ad ...

grenades, 264 units of

plastic explosive Plastic explosive is a soft and hand-moldable solid form of explosive material. Within the field of explosives engineering, plastic explosives are also known as putty explosives or blastics. Plastic explosives are especially suited for explos ...

s, and 102

explosive charge An explosive (or explosive material) is a reactive substance that contains a great amount of potential energy that can produce an explosion if released suddenly, usually accompanied by the production of light, heat, sound, and pressure. An expl ...

s. Following an anonymous tip-off, some of the weapons were found in

Chamusca Chamusca () is a municipality in Santarém District in Portugal. The population in 2021 was 8,530, in an area of 746.01 km². The present Mayor is Paulo Queimado, elected by the Socialist Party (Portugal), Socialist Party. The municipal holi ...

on 18 October 2017. An investigation into the recovery of the weapons led to the September 2018 arrests of six military officials from the National Republican Guard and the Military Judicial Police (PJM), including the head of the PJM, Coronel Luís Augusto Vieira. Amid accusations of a military cover-up of the arms theft, Minister of National Defence

José Alberto Azeredo Lopes José Alberto de Azeredo Lopes (born 20 June 1961) is a Portuguese politician who served as Ministry of National Defence (Portugal), Minister of National Defence from November 2015 to October 2018. Azeredo Lopes previously served as the preside ...

resigned on 12 October 2018. Azeredo Lopes has denied any involvement in the alleged cover-up.

References

2017 in Portugal 2018 in Portugal Crime in Portugal Military scandals 2017 crimes in Portugal {{Portugal-stub