Nine Irish organised crime gangs, with some 40 criminals involved, are operating across Europe, according to the European police intelligence agency Europol.
The agency said today it was tracking the activities of 100 separate organised crime gangs with the help of intelligence from various national police forces.
Many of the gangs are believed to be involved in major drug smuggling operations across the continent.
The Assistant Garda Commissioner Dermot Jennings said today the gardaí are working “very closely” with their counterparts in Europe to provide information on the activities of Irish criminals abroad.
Speaking in Mullingar today, Assistant Commissioner Jennings said that alongside 26 other European Police forces, members of An Garda Síochana are based with Europol in The Hague on a full-time basis and they are “up to date” with the activities of a variety of Irish criminals known to be operating on foreign shores.
“We work very closely with Europol and indeed with Interpol and other organisations including the FBI, and there is an open flow of information between the police force here, Northern Ireland, the UK and Europe with regard to organised crime in, and from, this country.”
He would not specify if there has been an increase in the information passing through the organisations in recent months, but communication between organisations “is improving all the time”.