MADRID: Spanish Customs police stated that a Large quantities of hashish were shipped to a private jetty on the River Guadarranque 29 smugglers have been arrested in connection with the seizure by the Policía Nacional and the Spanish customs authorities of 4.7 tons of hashish in the Campo de Gibraltar in the province of Cádiz as operation ALMINA draws to a close.
One of the houses searched during the police operation has a jetty in the River Guadarranque, and was the destination for boats arriving from Morocco carrying bundles of hashish into Spain. Among those arrested is one of the most important narcotics dealers in the area of the Campo de Gibraltar known as “Messi” who was arrested in October in a preliminary phase of the operation.
The investigation first began in 2014 as an operation to dismantle a group working in the Campos de Gibraltar in the municipality of la Línea de la Concepción (Cádiz), which was known to be importing large quantities of drugs into Spain using semi-rigid boats to run the drugs in from the coast.
The gang were known to have a significant vigilance service which not only warned the operators of the movements of local police on land, but also kept a watch out at sea, however, by bringing in the Guardia Civíl, these operations were by-passed enabling Customs to intercept a 14 metre long vessel carrying 3200 kilos of hashish in March of this year. Later in March a further 1023 kilos were intercepted in a semi-rigid launch and 10 people were arrested as a vehicle arrived to offload the drugs.
On the 12th May this year a further interception of 500 kilos of drugs took place in Málaga when two individuals transporting drugs from one of the storage locations used by the gang were stopped by police. Last week six separate raids were undertaken in home and business premises, during which four semi-rigid boats, a recreational yacht, a number of weapons and vehicles were seized, and a further 13 people arrested.
