The two treasure hunters who triggered gold fever in Poland with claims of finding a Nazi train laden with WW2 loot may end up behind bars before they hit the jackpot.

The head of the regional conservation authority for Walbzrych, Barbara Nowak-Obelinda, has filed a complaint with prosecutors, claiming the German and the Polish man who allegedly found the train buried eight metres below ground did not have the necessary permits to go looking for it.

Mrs Nowak-Obelinda, from the Lower Silesian Conservator of Monuments, filed a complaint with the District prosecutor's office saying that the pair had searched for the train 'without permission' and that 'using devices such as ground penetrating radar is an offence punishable by a fine, community service or detention for 30 days.'

'Finders': Treasure hunters Piotr Koper (left) and Andreas Richter (right), show a radar image they say proves the existence of the Nazi gold train dumped at the end of WWII and buried in a hill near Walbrzych, Poland

Radar images: Koper and Richter are claiming a ten per cent reward for their find in Poland. But authorities there today say the men face arrest and possible prison because they searched for the train without permits

Since August the reports about the gold train have lured prospectors from far and wide in Europe to the small town 300 miles from Berlin in an area of Poland that was German before and during WW2.

The men, Piotr Koper and Andreas Richter, said they used ground-penetrating radar to find the train allegedly buried by retreating German forces in the dying days of the war. The myth of vast treasure being aboard has circulated in the towns and villages of the region ever since.

The prosecution of the two men, although a trivial charge in itself, is meant to deter fresh waves of Klondike hunters swarming to the area. Authorities fear that someone could be killed if they wander too close to the modern-day railway line which links Walbzrych to the city of Wroclaw.

Mrs Nowak-Obelinda said: 'We want no new waves of treasure seekers who ignore the rules.'

The two finders of the alleged train last week presented new radar images which experts remained sceptical of.

Polish troops are due to examine the site with special equipment but the exact time of a detailed search has not been agreed upon, but will probably not be until next summer.

Last week Koper and Richter hinted that the fabled Amber Room of the Czars might be aboard the train. The room composed of panels of amber was looted by Nazi troops in 1941 from a palace outside Leningrad and has never been seen since.

It would be worth around 200 million pounds today.

Missing treasure: Since the end of WWII, hunters have risked their lives to uncover the £20billion-worth of Nazi treasure left behind. The Amber Room of the Czars (pictured) is the most sought-after of them all

Discovery: Legend has it that the Nazis hid the mystery train packed with gold, cash and loot in their underground network of tunnels to help SS war criminals to fund new lives abroad at the end of WWII

Trail: Polish forces are awaiting permission from authorities to start digging and finally uncover the mystery of what really lies eight metres below the ground at the end of a stretch of rail track near Walbrzych, Poland

But the train - if it indeed exists - might only be laden with war materiel destined for any one of a number of arms industries built in a honeycomb of tunnels in the area designed to withstand Allied air attacks.

The site where the train is supposed to be hidden lies on a railway track between Wroclaw and Walbrzych.

In January 1945, the Red Army began its rampage across Eastern Europe heading for Berlin.

As Germans fled the advancing Soviet forces, looted valuables were shifted from across Germany and Nazi-occupied Europe.

The loot was destined for a number of purposes: getaway money for high-ranking war criminals, the basis for a German resistance movement called 'Werewolf' intended to fight the occupiers; and to become the pension funds for generals whose vast estates bequeathed to them by a grateful Fuhrer in the east which fell into the hands of new, unforgiving owners.

There could also be more than just the one 100-metre long train hidden in the complex network of tunnels built under the Nazi's local headquarters at the castle of Ksiaz and deep into the surrounding hills.

On Thursday a Polish official confirmed new ground-penetrating radar photographs detail the existence of a massive 500 acre tunnel system near to the spot where the fabled train may lie.

Breaking cover: Koper (right) and Richter (left) 'discovered' the hidden train close to the small town of Walbrzych in south-west Poland after local explorer Tadeusz Slowikowski (left) apparently revealed its location

'The studies confirm the existence of a large tunnel complex', said Krzysztof Kwiatkowski, of the municipality Walim to a radio station in nearby Wroclaw.

He said the municipality had examined the site. The claims of the two men have been ridiculed in recent weeks by experts who said they could have easily manipulated the alleged computer images of the buried freight train.

But the confirmation by Kwiatkowski that the tunnel system itself exists is certain to reignite gold fever in the region.

Believers in the tall tale of a train loaded with gold worth in the billions are giving more weight to it having having originated in Breslau - now the Polish city of Wroclaw - back in 1945.

The world will never know just how much treasure the Nazis plundered - but it was an awful lot. And a lot of it was stuffed on to trains headed for the Fatherland as the Reich began to crumble.

Just two thirds of the gold stolen by the Nazis from European central banks during the war has ever been found.

The favourite theory emerging now among the townspeople of Walbryzch is that the treasure departed from Breslau, 50 miles away, in May 1945 on its way back to Berlin.

'Found': If it is the missing Nazi gold train which has been found, historians say that when Polish forces begin digging they will find an armoured locomotive similar to the one pictured used by the Nazis during WWII

Discovery: The alleged uncovering of the Nazi gold train has sparked feverish global excitement with the eyes of the world focused on the town of Walbrzych in Poland (pictured)

Pinpointed: Nazi gold train is said to be hidden along 4km stretch of rail track between Wroclaw and Walbrzch in Poland. It was apparently concealed by SS forces as the Soviet Red Army advanced in 1945

Chief cashier of the dreaded SS, Bruno Melmer, was in charge of dozens of shipments aboard trains trundling back to the heart of the Reich. This included the grisly shipments of gold teeth ripped from death camp victims after they were gassed.

Missing from Poland, however, remains hundreds of tons of gold from various Jewish ghettoes which never made it back to Berlin.

Nazis enriched themselves massively in the war and, if the theories are correct, were probably moving the train back to Germany as the tide of the conflict turned against them - to finance getaways, new identities and as the bedrock for their pensions when the shooting stopped.

Die Welt newspaper in Germany gave credence to the Breslau claim in a report in which it stated; 'Here the former Goebbels confidante Karl Hanke as Gauleiter since 1941. He was so greedy he was known among other Nazi officials as a 'golden pheasant.''

With Hanke plugged directly into the dark heart of Nazism via the office of propaganda chieftan Goebbels, it would be easy to commandeer much-needed rolling stock to form a 'special train' with an exceedingly special cargo in those days of confusion, terror and death.

The tunnel complex which Kwiatkowski says the local council has found was called 'Riese' - Giant - by the Nazis who constructed it using slave labourers from concentration camps to house arms industries to keep them safe from air raids. Stretching from the Gothic castle of Ksiaz they built the labyrinth deep into the surrounding mountains.

Uncovered: Workers inspect gold bars taken from Jews by the Nazi's and stashed in German Salt Mines

Riches: This crate of gold wedding bands which the Nazis stole from the Jews was discovered by US troops in 1945, but up to £20billion-worth of 'Nazi treasure' is still missing

Nazi treasure has always caught the imagination of people. The prospect of finding the Amber Room of the Czars, or the lost Rembrandts pilfered by regime magpie Hermann Goering, fuels a weekend treasure hunting obsession deep in the soul of many Germans.

The news of the heavily armoured freight train parked in the yet-to-be-disclosed tunnel has sent people from across Germany and Poland to the area with metal detectors. Police are now issuing 100 pound fines to trespassers.