1. Skip to content
  2. Skip to main menu
  3. Skip to more DW sites
Live TV
Latest audioLatest videos
In focus
Russia's war in UkraineGerman election 2025COP29 climate talks
CrimeItaly

Italy: Police seize record 5 tons of cocaine near Sicily

July 21, 2023

The cocaine was discovered while being transferred from a ship onto a smaller vessel off the southern coast of Sicily. The seizure is the largest-ever on Italian territory.

https://p.dw.com/p/4UDp1
Packages containing cocaine seized during a police operation
The ship carrying the drugs had been under observation by authorities Image: Guardia di Finanza/REUTERS

Italian police seized a record 5.3 tons of cocaine during an operation off the southern coast of Sicily, authorities said on Friday.

The haul had an estimated value of €850 million ($946 million) and is the largest cocaine seizure ever reported on Italian territory.

Five people have been arrested, the Guardia di Finanza said in a statement.

How were the drugs discovered? 

A merchant ship sailing from South America had already been under observation for several days, when a surveillance aircraft spotted packages being thrown from its deck into the waters of the Strait of Sicily to be collected by a fishing trawler.

In the early hours of Wednesday morning, investigators noticed numerous parcels being thrown into the water from the merchant vessel as a fishing boat approached. The crew of the smaller boat then retrieved the parcels.

The investigators stopped the trawler and found large quantities of drugs in a hidden compartment on the vessel. Two Tunisians, an Italian, an Albanian and a French national were arrested.

Sicilian regional president Renato Schifani called the operation a blow against drug smuggling.

"Drugs are a scourge of our society fueled by unscrupulous men who sow death by crushing hopes and destroying many families," he said in a statement.

los/wmr (dpa, Reuters)