Agents of the National Police have carried out an operation together with the police of Serbia that, coordinated by EUROPOL and with the collaboration of the Spanish Navy and the police of Portugal, Slovenia, Croatia, Brazil, Poland, France, the DEA of the United States and the MAOC-N (Maritime Analyst and Operations Centre Narcotics), has allowed to dismantle a criminal organization of citizens of Balkan origin dedicated, allegedly, to the introduction and distribution of cocaine in Europe from South America by sea. Specifically, almost 2,700 kilograms of cocaine have been intercepted, which were transported in a total of 89 sports bags, on board a sailboat in international waters near the Canary Islands.
After the interception, the police authorities of Serbia arrested the two crew members, and later the leader and three other members of the organization in Serbia, with a total of six arrests. The investigation began in early 2022 when, thanks to the collaboration between the Spanish and Serbian police, different information was received from the Slavic authorities pointing out that "an important criminal organization in that country was preparing a cocaine transport operation by sea."
During the investigation, they detected that the members and the environment of the organization carried out constant displacements. In this way, they found out that the alleged leader traveled to Spain on several occasions, using a false identity as a Croatian citizen trying to evade the international requirements that were known to him. In addition, once the investigations progressed, it was possible to prove that in Croatia there were meetings of the organization with the Latin American suppliers of the drug, and in Slovenia those who would later be the crew members of the vessel used for the transport of the drug were identified, in addition to confirming that several members of the organization traveled on several occasions to the archipelago of Cape Verde and to Latin American countries such as Colombia and Brazil.
With all the information obtained, an assault team from the GEO, on board a ship of the Spanish Navy, set sail from Las Palmas de Gran Canaria and carried out the boarding of the sailboat in the high seas during the early morning of August 24 about 700 miles west of the Canary Islands. Several state-of-the-art GPS devices and a telephone with satellite coverage were also recovered. In addition, after the arrests, a total of 15 home searches were carried out and 550,000 euros in cash, two high-end vehicles and several luxury watches were seized.
The investigation currently remains open and more arrests are not ruled out, police sources report.
