The son of a 1970s leftist militant who helped found the notorious Red Brigades (BR) terrorist network was one of two men arrested on Monday on charges of trying to revive the leftist militant group. Manolo Morlacchi, 39, is the son of the late Pierino Morlacchi, who co-founded the first BR 'cell' in 1972 together with the Renato Curcio, the group's leader during its early years. Morlacchi was arrested together with Costantino Virgilio, 34, with word files described as a ''computer manual for revolutionaries''. According to police, the file contained instructions for encrypting documents and avoiding police detection on the internet.

After a five-hour interrogation on Monday the suspects were taken to custody where they will await trial on charges of conspiring with terrorists. Police said the two have been on their radar since June when they arrested five other BR revivalists allegedly planning an attack on the July Group of Eight summit in L'Aquila. While neither Morlacchi nor Virgilio were arrested in the June operation, investigators searched their homes and found large amounts of material suggesting that they were both core members. Morlacchi is a well known figure in radical circles in Milan and came to national prominence in 2007 with the publication of his memoirs, entitled ''Fleeing Forward'' about his upbringing in a militant leftist family. In addition to his father, his East German mother was also a BR member and likewise in and out of jail for much of his childhood. His brother, Ernesto, is also suspected of collaborating with neo-BR groups and was among those investigated in June.

After the 1999 and 2002 killing of two government aides, authorities have been on the alert against a resurgence of leftist terrorism, which culminated in 1978 with the kidnapping and murder of Christian Democrat leader Aldo Moro. But Interior Minister Roberto Maroni hailed the arrests as ''proof that law enforcement is on top of BR terrorism''. Maroni vowed that the government would keep its ''guard up'' against a possible return to the kind of political violence which characterized the heyday of the BR in the late 1970s. A Senator with the opposition Democratic Party Silvana Amati said the inter-generational aspect of Monday's arrests should remind parents to teach their children just how bad that period really was. "Helping children understand what it was like back then is the best way to keep them from being infected by the anger that made it all possible," she said.