Fishing boat apprehended with cocaine

[TamaraEnLaPlaya]

Noticias:

A fishing boat with 560 kilos of cocaine is involved 270 miles south of Fuerteventura.

Eight people have been arrested in a boat that sailed without flag or badges, the ship has been transferred to the port of La Luz

The Civil Guard, in a joint operation with officials of the Customs Surveillance Service of the Tax Agency and National Police have intercepted in the early morning of June 3 in waters south of the Canary Islands a fishing boat without flag or visible identifying signs that was transporting 560 kilos of cocaine to Europe. In the same action, the eight crew members of the vessel, of Brazilian nationality, have been arrested.

The operation, called Blanco Brasil, led to the boarding of the boat, a fishing boat of 19 meters in length transformed for the illicit transport of narcotics, about 270 nautical miles south of the Canary Islands for its subsequent transfer and arrival at the port of Las Palmas this morning.

The proceedings, directed and coordinated by the Anti-Drug Prosecutor's Office of the National High Court, begin, within the framework of international cooperation, with the exchange of information between the investigating agencies, the MAOC-N (Atlantic Analysis and Operations Center) and the CITCO (Intelligence Center Against Terrorism and Organized Crime), which determined the existence of a vessel suspected of illicit drug trafficking from South America.

From that moment, the Civil Guard, in coordination with the Deputy Directorate of Customs Surveillance of the Tax Agency, and the Central Narcotics Brigade of the National Police, establishes the appropriate deployment for the location, identification and, where appropriate, the approach of the target, which is finally carried out by the Special Operations Ship 'Petrel' of the Tax Agency.

The search for the target was highly complex in nautical terms, given the scarce information on the geolocation of the ship. In turn, the navigation conditions up to the time of the intervention had been complex due to adverse Weather conditions when passing through the Madeira archipelago due to the Storm of the Azores.

Finally, once the fishing vessel was detected, a quick and clear boarding action was carried out in technical safety conditions despite the state of the sea.

During the course of the intervention, a significant number of bales of those usually used for cocaine trafficking were found. At that time, the eight crew members of the fishing boat without identification were arrested, as well as the vessel was secured.

Once the detainees were embarked on the 'Petrel', the fishing boat was towed and transferred to the port of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria. Both the detainees, as well as the boat, the drugs and the Police proceedings will be placed at the disposal of the Central Court of Instruction acting as Guard of the National Court.

This operation is one of those carried out in the framework of the fight against drug trafficking in the so-called 'Atlantic Route' of cocaine, known to be used by fishing vessels that, coming from South America, transship the narcotic substances in the middle of the Atlantic for their subsequent introduction into the European continent.