ATHENS (Reuters) -Six employees at Greece’s largest port Piraeus, arrested for allegedly collaborating in a gang smuggling cocaine hidden in delivery containers from Latin America, have been jailed pending trial on Friday, authorized sources stated.
The case is the third investigation since 2023 that has led to the arrest of port employees on drug trafficking prices.
The suspects, employed by a personal firm dealing with cargo operations at Piraeus port have been arrested on Monday. On Friday they responded to prices together with participation in a world prison organisation at the very least since 2024, in line with police officers. They’ve denied wrongdoing.
The medicine have been hid in refrigerated containers loaded with bananas which have been shipped from Ecuador, the police stated.
Greek police stated the investigation, which revealed the gang’s techniques and included surveillance of their communications, was launched after a tip-off by the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration.
The prison ring, led by an Albanian gang, exploited the employees’ entry to port amenities and information of loading and unloading cargo procedures, the police officers stated.
The alleged gang members have been tasked with finding the ships and extracting the cocaine parcels from the containers, and one in every of them was in touch with the drug consumers in Albania, the officers added. Three weapons and bullets have been confiscated throughout the operation.
Defence lawyer Nikos Aletras informed Reuters that the preliminary investigation was “rushed” and the costs have been aggravated, as seven suspects appeared earlier than a prosecutor on Friday to reply to the accusations. Six of them have been later detained pending trial and a seventh suspect was launched.
South American manufacturing of cocaine has surged over the previous decade, with traffickers serving to to show Europe into a serious shopper and a transit level for cocaine. European international locations have been seizing file portions of cocaine yearly since 2017.
(Reporting by Yannis Souliotis; Writing by Renee Maltezou; modifying by Diane Craft)
