machine gun

According to The Times, the Russian merchant ship was transporting military hardware from the Russian naval base in Tartus, Syria, with crew on the accompanying warship seen burning papers and manning the ship's machine guns.

The sounds of helicopter gunfire and heavy machine guns signalled something more intense than the crackle of AK-47 that he normally heard.

"Human rights, yes, but what about human rights for good people? We're in a war. Mafias use machine guns, grenades. The militarisation aims to establish peace," he says.

The soldiers opened fire as the men arrived at St Patrick's Church car park in a hijacked lorry which had a heavy machine gun welded to its tailgate.

Eight machine gun vehicle mounts, seven freestanding machine gun tripods, medical equipment, 40 pairs of binoculars and 18 bayonets also went missing from the facility, police said.