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Greek police on Wednesday said they had broken up a major network smuggling cocaine into Europe, arresting ten people after a weekend raid off the coast of France.
Citizen’s Protection Minister Michalis Chrisochoidis told reporters the operation had been carried out in cooperation with the US Drug Enforcement Administration and the French navy.
The quantity of cocaine seized Sunday on a Greek fishing vessel is estimated at between 3.4 and 4.7 tonnes, the police said. The drugs had been loaded onto the vessel in early December off the island of Martinique, they said.
Police had tracked the racket, which mainly involved Greeks, since October 2024, officers said.
The gang used fishing vessels that appeared to be engaged in legitimate commercial fishing in international waters. A so-called mothership brought in the drugs, which were initially loaded onto the fishing boats and subsequently onto yachts. Occasionally, the cargo was dumped near the European coast for divers to retrieve.
Additional suspects are sought in Latin America, Africa and the European Union, while the gang’s proceeds are estimated to exceed 100 million euros ($118 million), officers said.
