UK’s biggest ever haul of class A drugs as £512m of cocaine found in North Sea boat

Three tonnes of cocaine worth £512million, the UK’s biggest class A drugs haul , were found on a boat seized in the North Sea.

The captain and first officer of tugboat MV Hamal were yesterday found guilty of drug trafficking.

It had left Turkey for Guyana in South America where drugs were loaded.

In April 2015, after a tip by French authorities, Royal Navy and Border Force vessels boarded the Hamal 100 miles off Aberdeen.

In port it took three days to find all the drugs.

Charges at Glasgow high court against four crew were not proven. Three others were cleared earlier. Mumin Sahin and Emin Ozmen will be sentenced next month.

The Border Force said: “We are protecting communities from harm these drugs could have caused.”

Two men have been found guilty of smuggling more than three tonnes of cocaine – the biggest Class A drug haul in British history.

A captain and first officer were found guilty of drug trafficking after cocaine with an estimated street value of £512 million was seized from their tugboat.

The class A drugs were found hidden in a secret hatch on board the Tanzanian flagged MV Hamal in April last year.

The vessel was intercepted by Royal Navy destroyer HMS Somerset and Border Force cutter HMC Valiant in the North Sea around 100 miles off the coast of Aberdeen.

After getting a tip-off from French authorities, National Crime Agency (NCA) officers boarded the MV Hamal and escorted it into the Port of Aberdeen.

Source: Mirror uk