If you’ve taken a long-distance bus in Andalucia recently, there’s a chance you were unwittingly involved in a multi-million euro drug smuggling operation.
It comes after the Guardia Civil dismantled an organised crime gang in Almeria that was using passenger buses to traffic hashish from Morocco to Belgium.
The narcotics were concealed inside hidden compartments built into the buses’ refrigeration systems.
The police operation, codenamed Anisakis, resulted in five arrests and the seizure of assets valued at €2.8 million, according to the Guardia Civil’s Almeria command.
Officers seized around 140kg of hashish, more than €130,000 in cash and 15 vehicles, including two coaches and several high-end cars, following eight property searches carried out in Almeria city, Roquetas de Mar, Vícar and Melilla.
The investigation began earlier this year with the support of Moroccan police and customs authorities, who helped identify a trafficking network with its logistical base in Almeria but an international hierarchical structure.
According to investigators, the alleged ringleader lived in north-eastern France, close to the Belgian border, where the drugs were received and distributed across the European black market.
Meanwhile, the logistical arm of the organisation operated out of Almeria, where members allegedly set up a coach company as a front, specifically to facilitate drug transport and manufacture the hidden compartments used to conceal the hashish.
The gang is believed to have carried out weekly journeys between Morocco and EU countries, using long-distance routes to hide the drugs in double-layered compartments within the buses’ cooling systems – locations that are difficult to detect during routine inspections.
In addition to the drug seizures and arrests, the operation has targeted the group’s financial structure, which investigators say was used to launder proceeds from drug trafficking.
Authorities have frozen 19 bank accounts, seized 28 properties and 50 vehicles as part of the investigation.
The operation was carried out by the Judicial Police Unit (UOPJ) of the Guardia Civil in Almeria, with support from the UOPJ in Melilla, the canine unit, Seprona and the USECIC specialist unit.
