Cocaine worth €6m seized as Garda investigation targets major Irish crime cartel

Around €6 million worth of cocaine has been seized as part of a major Garda international crackdown.

Searches were continuing on Tuesday afternoon with gardaí describing it as a live operation.

The Irish Times reports that the west Dublin drugs gang was a significant target of the operation, as were other figures in the drugs underworld in the Republic. There have been some arrests of Irish suspects, with evidence seized from them.

Other Irish criminals have been targeted in search operations, with evidence relating to them seized, and now significant criminal investigations into them.

Europol has described the operation as “a major action against an encrypted communication platform used for criminal activities, such as large-scale drugs trafficking, homicides and money laundering”.

As well as the Garda and Europol, the infiltration of the encrypted messaging platform and the use of the evidence extracted from it has also involved the FBI, Canadian Mounted Police, French National Gendarmerie and Australian Federal Police. There has also been involvement by the authorities in Iceland, Italy, the Netherlands and Sweden.

The largest Irish gang caught up in the international inquiry has been a target of the Garda’s specialist units for decades. Its members have served lengthy prison sentences in the Republic and elsewhere in Europe.

Though not on the scale of the Kinahan cartel, it is regarded as having profited from the demise of the cartel’s Irish operation, which was effectively crushed as part of the Garda’s response into the Kinahan-Hutch feud from 2016.

The sting began on Monday night in Co Wexford where raids were carried out.

Millions of euro worth of cocaine was seized with the full amount yet to be quantified.

Follow-up searches were conducted in Wexford and Dublin and a number of arrests were made.

In a statement on Tuesday afternoon, gardaí said it was a live operation, and they could not comment any further.