Spanish Police News

A Greek appeals court on Friday reduced the prison sentences of 11 men involved in trafficking 1.2 metric tons of cocaine from the Caribbean into Europe and Africa, in one of the biggest drug busts in Greece's history.Greek police said in 2020 it had dismantled the criminal group after a months-long investigation with assistance from the United States' Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) and the Albanian and Spanish police.A court in 2021 had handed the defendants, nationals of Albania, the Netherlands and Greece, multi-year sentences including life imprisonment.

Spanish police said on Friday they had seized four metric tons of cocaine hidden in rice sacks at Barcelona's port, breaking up a crime ring that operated in Spain, Paraguay and Britain.The drug smugglers processed the drugs into powder in Asuncion, Paraguay, and then put them plastic bags which were hidden inside sacks of rice sewn by hand before shipping them to Europe, the statement said.The containers arrived at Barcelona's port earlier this year but the haul of cocaine was only discovered in July when the smugglers moved the containers, police said.Authorities in Paraguay and Britain seiz

In 2018, convicted cocaine trafficker Slobodan Kostovski fled a Brazilian prison and made his way back to Europe with a fake passport.The Serbian senior quickly fell into old habits, police allege. Last August, Kostovski was arrested in Belgrade, accused of shipping 2.7 metric tonnes of cocaine from Brazil aboard a 22-meter vessel apprehended near Spain’s Canary Islands.Nicknamed “the General” by his associates, he had been trafficking “large amounts” of powder to “Europe for a long period of time,” Serbian police wrote in a 2022 intelligence report obtained exclusively by Reuters.

Spanish police seized eight tonnes of cocaine from Suriname hidden in a container disguised as a power generator in the southern port of Algeciras, tax authorities said on Monday.The haul of cocaine, one of the largest ever intercepted in Spain, was inside a metal structure designed to escape detection from scanners.But customs agents detected a large quantity of stacked goods that practically filled the container, so they forced it open.The drug smugglers had planned a route designed to make the discovery of the cargo's true contents as difficult as possible.

Spanish police have made a record cocaine seizure, finding 9.5 tonnes of the drug hidden among boxes of bananas in a shipping container from Ecuador in the southern port of Algeciras.The stash was the largest ever found in a single container in Spain, the police said in a statement."This operation was an unprecedented blow to one of the world's most important criminal organizations in cocaine distribution, targeting major criminal networks in Europe," it said.The boxes were marked…

Spanish police seized 4.5 tonnes of cocaine with an estimated street value of 105 million euros ($114 million) after raiding a cattle ship off the Canary Islands earlier this week, a statement said on Saturday.The ship had stopped at ports in about a dozen countries before Tuesday's raid, and police said drug smugglers had started using livestock ships because it was more difficult for police to trace their illicit cargo."International organisations are reinventing themselves to transport drugs from Latin America to Europe, using livestock to make the control and localisation more difficult," the Spanish police statement said.Police arrested 28 crew members on the Togo-flagged Orion V, which had been trailed from Colombia in an operation by Spanish authorities, the U.S.

Three migrants rescued in Spain's Canary Islands, after apparently enduring an 11-day journey from Nigeria crouched on the rudder of a fuel tanker, should now be returned home under stowaway laws, a police spokesman told Reuters on Tuesday. In a photograph distributed on Twitter by the Spanish coast guard on Monday, the three stowaways are shown crouching on the rudder under the hull, just above the waterline of the Alithini II.The 183-metre ship, sailing under a Maltese flag, arrived in Las Palmas in Gran Canaria after setting out from Lagos in Nigeria on Nov.

Fiji court ruled on Tuesday that the United States can seize a Russian-owned superyacht, 21 days after it arrived and was impounded by police, as the United States and its allies press Russia over its invasion of Ukraine.U.S. authorities assert that the luxury vessel, the Amadea, is ultimately owned by Russian oligarch Suleiman Kerimov, who has been sanctioned by the United States and the European Union.The U.S. Justice Department's Taskforce KleptoCapture has focused on seizing yachts and other luxury assets to put the finances of Russian oligarchs under strain in a bid to pressure Russian President Vladimir Putin over the war in Ukraine.

Spanish police on Monday impounded a superyacht belonging to Russian oligarch Viktor Vekselberg on behalf of U.S. authorities, the first time the United States has seized property belonging to a Russian oligarch since its invasion of Ukraine in February.Valued at more than 90 million euros ($99 million), the 78-metre-long "Tango" (255 ft) was seized in a shipyard on the Mediterranean island of Mallorca, the Guardia Civil police and the U.S. Justice Department said in parallel…

The discovery of a submarine carrying 3,000 kg (3.3 tons) of cocaine off the coast of Spain marks a "historic" turning point in the battle against drug trafficking, Spanish authorities said on Wednesday.Police described it as the first "narcosubmarine" to be intercepted in Europe, adding in a statement that it had been found in waters off the northwestern region of Galicia on Saturday, stuffed with 152 neatly-wrapped bales of cocaine.The estimated street value of the drugs is 100 million euros ($110.22 million)…

Spanish police seized more than two tons of cocaine from a ship with a Venezuelan flag in the Atlantic Ocean and arrested the seven crew members, Spain's interior ministry said on Monday. The operation, carried out alongside the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, the UK's National Crime Agency and Portuguese police, took place earlier this month, on May 4. The seven people on board were Venezuelan nationals, the ministry said, adding that a gun had also been seized alongside 2400 kg of cocaine. The vessel, a small, rusted fishing boat according to images distributed by police, has since been towed to Spain's Canary Islands. Separately…

A boat containing around 40 African migrants including a toddler girl landed on a beach on the Spanish island of Gran Canaria, sea rescue services said on Wednesday. The Spanish Canary Islands off the Moroccan coast were a key route around 10 years ago for migrants from Africa trying to reach Europe, but their numbers fell after Spain increased patrolling. Europe is in crisis as hundreds of thousands of refugees fleeing war and economic migrants escaping poverty are arriving on the continent, crossing the Mediterranean on unsafe boats and over land across the Balkan peninsula. The group of 33 men, six women and the child, were all in good health when they arrived late on Tuesday, a government official said. One of the women was pregnant, the official said.

Rolls-Royce has secured a contract to supply waterjets for two Spanish Police Guardia Civil 20m Patrol boats in Spain. These vessels will be built by Astilleros Gondan Shipyard. This is the first time Rolls-Royce waterjets will feature on Guardia Civil boats, which operate in challenging conditions of strong winds and currents in demanding circumstances. The stainless steel series waterjets have high fuel efficiency due to good towing capability and acceleration as well as excellent durability. This enables them to have low servicing requirements, helping to meet the demands made of them during the lifetime of the vessel. Jose Antonio Losada…

The Basque separatist group ETA planned to set off a car bomb aboard British-bound ferry Val de Loire, but the activists in charge of the attack were reportedly captured by Spanish police last week. It was reported that the ETA wanted to drive a car bomb onto the ferry, which was bound for Plymouth in southwestern Britain, and blow it up at its point of origin in the Spanish port at Santander. The armed group allegedly ntended to give authorities a warning to allow the boat to be evacuated before the explosion. A suspected ETA guerrilla who was captured last week tipped off police, saying that the ferry was a possible target. It was reported that a ferry schedule was found among the suspect's possessions but that it could not be confirmed whether there was a real threat to the boat.

About 30 people were injured last Tuesday when Spanish police used rubber bullets and smoke grenades to disperse protesting shipworkers in the southern city of Seville, authorities said. Around 700 workers took part in the protest at the Astilleros Sevilla shipbuilding yard on the Guadalquivir River to demand subsidies for the industry, despite European Union directives against such aid. Unions blamed the police for the violence. "The police were not interested in any mediation, they simply set about clearing the area using disproportionate force," said Ignacio Sanchez, a union representative at the shipyard. Workers armed with pieces of metal fought with police and set two cars ablaze as burning barricades.