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Australian Police have seized 2.3 tonnes of cocaine from a broken-down boat off the coast of Queensland, authorities mentioned on Monday.
Eleven males and two juveniles have been arrested, together with the vessel’s crew and others ready on the shore to gather the unlawful cargo.
The medication had an estimated avenue worth of A$760m ($490m; £388m), with the potential to be distributed throughout 11.7 million separate avenue offers – making it the most important cocaine bust in Australian historical past.
The Australian Federal Police (AFP) alleged one of many males arrested on Saturday night time was vice-president of the Comanchero outlaw motorbike membership’s Brisbane chapter.
Biker gangs are infamous in Australia for his or her drug violence, with greater than 1,000 shootings recorded because the Nineteen Eighties.
This current cocaine bust got here as a part of a wider investigation into the Comanchero gang, codenamed Operation Tyrrendor, which started final month.
Authorities mentioned they obtained intelligence suggesting a felony syndicate with hyperlinks to the gang was planning to import unlawful medication into Australia.
This comes after studies final week that the Colombian navy intercepted a semi-submersible carrying cocaine to Australia.
Investigators advised reporters in Brisbane the file cocaine cargo had come from an unidentified South American nation.
The AFP labored with the Queensland Police Service (QPS) and the Australian Border Force (ABF) to trace a fishing boat, lately bought by a 35-year-old man.
On Saturday night time, it was getting used transport the cocaine supply from a bigger mothership to the Queensland coast when it suffered a mechanical fault, police mentioned.
Stranded about 18km from the north-eastern tip of K’gari, it was intercepted by the AFP and QPS, who discovered 51 bales tied with rope netting.
Each bale contained 40kg of cocaine, totalling 2.34 tonnes.
Two males have been arrested on the boat and two others have been arrested on the coast whereas ready for the cargo.
An additional three arrests have been made at a close-by fast-food restaurant, with 5 others at a visitors cease.
The last arrest was made in Brisbane after the AFP and QPS executed a search warrant.
All 11 males and two juveniles have been have been charged with conspiracy to import a industrial amount of cocaine, which carries a most penalty of life imprisonment.
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