South American cartels are increasingly shipping cocaine to Europe via West Africa, writes Conor Lally, Crime Correspondent
While gardaí are unsure of the route by which yesterday's cocaine seizure reached the Cork coast, recent seizures suggest much of the drug is being shipped from South America to Europe via West Africa.
Southern Spain has in recent years become the base of choice for Irish and international drugs wholesalers and also the shipping hub for the European distribution of cargoes of illicit drugs.
Shipped consignments have been coming from South America through the Cape Verde islands off the Atlantic coast, or through Ghana, Nigeria and Togo. Once they reach these transit destinations they are re-exported to European markets, including Ireland.
United Nations officials have recently warned that former Portuguese colony Guinea-Bissau, south of Senegal, could become overrun by drug cartels which its under-resourced security forces are ill-equipped to tackle.
West African countries are used as transit states because of lax security and the ease with which local criminals can be recruited to assist the smuggling.
Once the drug is forwarded to continental Europe, usually Spain, it is smuggled into Ireland.
Throughout the 1990s a large number of smuggling operations were detected which, like yesterday's botched attempt, involved drugs being taken to the Cork coast where efforts were made to land the cargo.
Other gangs have preferred to load drugs shipments into the door panels of cars or onto lorries in Spain. These vehicles then enter Ireland via ferry ports, either directly from continental European ports or via UK ports.
Some of the key players in the Irish drugs trade over the past 20 years relocated to Spain after the Veronica Guerin murder inquiry and the establishment of the Criminal Assets Bureau.
Many of these men are still active in sourcing drugs from international cartels for forwarding to gangs in Ireland.
These older criminals have since been joined by others, such as the Blanchardstown Westies gang leaders Shane Coates and Stephen Sugg who were murdered in Spain in 2004.
Corkman Michael "Danser" Ahern, who was found murdered in a fridge freezer in Portugal in 2005, was a member of another Irish gang which was shipping drugs to Ireland.
Gardaí tracking yesterday's haul say it may be some time before its origins are traced. However, the Irishman under arrest last night has been living in Spain of late, leading officers to believe that the drugs were transported via that country.
"There is no doubt that gangs in South America are shipping the stuff more and more to west Africa and then on to Europe," said one reliable senior Garda source.
A police operation unfolding in Senegal over the past week demonstrates the logistics of major international shipments.
Last Wednesday when a broken-down, abandoned sailing boat drifted into the resort of Mbour, about 45 miles south of Dakar, it was found to be carrying cocaine worth €210 million.
Three men from Venezuela, Colombia and Ecuador were arrested in nearby towns in connection with the haul. They were found to be carrying guns, satellite navigation equipment and foreign and local currency. Three local men were also arrested.
Police in Senegal believe the ship had sailed from South America and that the drugs were most likely intended for distribution throughout the European market.