Two leaders of ETA, a separatist militant group in the Basque region, have been arrested in a village in France.
The arrests of David Pla, 40, and Iratxe Sorzábal, 43, "completes the decapitation of Eta", minister Jorge Fernandez Diaz told reporters.
He said that they are Spain's "currently two most wanted terrorists".
The arrests took place at a farmhouse in Saint-Étienne-de-Baïgorry in the French Pyrenees in an operation mounted jointly by Spain's Civil Guard and French domestic security agency, the DGSI.
"The arrests have dealt a crushing blow to the terrorist group dismantling the leadership responsible for managing the arsenal of weapons and explosives that Eta still has," according to a statement from Spain’s interior ministry.
"The two were the current leaders of ETA and their arrests have not only left the terrorist group without leadership but also weakens the entire terrorist organization."
False documents and weapons were also uncovered.
Pla has been in hiding since 2010, Sorzábal since 2001. She is accused of being involved in more than 20 terrorist attacks from 1994 to 1997 in which two police officers died and also responsible for the killing of two Civil Guard in 2007.
ETA has used violence in its 40 year campaign for independence from Spain. It stands accused of killing 829 people in total.
In October 2011 it renounced the use of arms, but has refused to give up its weapons or dissolve the organisation which has been demanded by both Spain and France.
It began a unilateral disarmament programme in early 2014, in cooperation with the International Verification Commission, an independent group of experts from various countries which is not recognised by the Spanish government.
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