John Culatto
POLICE seized 90,000 kilos of drugs in Malaga and arrested more than 4,000 people for trafficking offences in 2022.
This past year the Policia Nacional beat the Guardia Civil in terms of drugs seized with 50,000 kilos to 40,000 kilos respectively.
But the Guardia Civil arrested more people, putting nearly 2,500 people behind bars compared to the Policia Nacional with 1,484.
The majority of the drugs police found, a resounding 95%, was hashish.
It was followed by marijuana and cocaine, the central government representative in Malaga, Javier Salas, said.
The Udyco Drugs and Organised Crime Unit ‘dismantled a total of 60 criminal groups, seizing €2.65 million and freezing accounts worth €41.6 million’, Salas said.
He added that the government of Spain is doing ‘everything in our power’ to stop organised crime on the Costa del Sol.
Salas said that a lot of effort had been centred at national level around the area of the Gibraltar Campo plan that seeks to head off the hash smugglers.
They cross the Straits of Gibraltar from Morocco on speedboats tracked by Spanish police launches and helicopters.
He said this plan ‘is working’ and similar models have been used in other areas ‘because crime has moved’ to other areas of the Andalucian coast and Seville.
The announcement followed a raid on a warehouse in Granada used to transport hashish to northern Europe.
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