property damage has been inflicted as a result of these attacks. The frequency of attacks increased between 1993 and 1996. A two-year truce followed. Attacks resumed on 30 October 1998 with the partial destruction of the Belfort city hall, home town of the then Interior Minister Jean-Pierre Chevènement. Other subsequent targets included symbols of the French government such as administrative offices, police precincts and utility installations, as well as the home towns of then-Prime Minister Lionel Jospin. The latter attack, which occurred on 18 June 1999, was a result of the refusal, two days before, by the then French President Jacques Chirac to ratify the European Charter on Regional and Minority Languages. The 1999 Plévin heist and the ETA-ARB connection The theft of eight and a half tons of an explosive, Titadine 30, from one of the warehouses of the company Titanite SA, in Plévin on 28 September 1999 by an ETA and ARB commando is one of the most spectacular achievements of the ARB to date (the security alarm system had been carefully dismantled). This incident served to confirm suspicions about the nature of the relationship between the ETA and the Breton separatists. As the subsequent investigation revealed, ARB members had been hosting Basque separatists in Brittany prior to the heist. Spanish authorities even suspect that some ETA members may at times come to Brittany temporarily in search of a safe haven. The investigation also confirmed the close relationship between Emgann and the ARB as one of the former's members, Arnaud Vannier was arrested in connection with the Plévin heist when twenty-five sticks of dynamite and two detonators and two timers were found in the trunk of his car, all originating from the Plévin heist. Emgrann replied to the accusations saying that it was not responsible for the activities of individual members. Half a dozen individuals were subsequently arrested in connection with the heist. Three days after the heist, three ETA members were arrested near Pau, France, with a van containing two and a half tons of explosives, all originating from Plévin. Two other individuals, Denis Riou and Richard Lefaucheux, were arrested for their complicity in the heist (renting cars to pick up the Basque separatists and providing them with shelter in Lorient). McDonald’s bombing On Wednesday 19 April 2000, around 10 a.m., one and a half kilogram bomb placed near the drive-through of a McDonald's restaurant in Quévert,