S<\/span>pain has long been the\u00a0main gateway\u00a0for Moroccan hash into Europe, but authorities both sides of the Strait are getting serious about disrupting the contraband trade.<\/p>\n Authorities in Morocco actually arrested 644 people in just 48 hours in a counter-narcotics operation in the northern city of Ouida, according to a report<\/a> from the Italian news agency\u00a0ANSA on Feb. 16.<\/p>\n And while Morocco\u2019s border with Algeria is\u00a0officially sealed<\/a>, it clearly also remains porous to hash making its way toward European markets. According to the same ANSA report,\u00a0police in the border area arrested 533 people and seized over 20 kilograms of hashish<\/a>, with smaller quantities of heroin and other contraband.<\/p>\n Dramatic events are meanwhile reported from across the Strait in the Spanish port town of La L\u00ednea de la Concepci\u00f3n. On Feb. 8, some 20 hooded gunmen stormed into the local hospital, where their injured ringleader was being held. They overpowered police on guard there, and made off with the accused hash-smuggling ringleader, Samuel Crespo Dominguez, according to Spain\u2019s\u00a0El Pais\u00a0newspaper<\/a>.<\/p>\n A few days later, the judge investigating the break-out was surrounded and intimidated by a group of some 40 people \u2014 including some believed to be participants in the hospital raid, Britain\u2019s\u00a0The Independent\u00a0reports<\/a>.<\/p>\n That same week, 10 people were arrested \u2014 including one minor \u2014 in a fracas that ensued after a police patrol confronted a group of youths said to be local enforcers for the hash ring, dressed entirely in black with balaclavas covering their faces, in La Linea\u2019s notorious La Zabal district. (The unemployment rate in La L\u00ednea de la Concepci\u00f3n is 35 percent, according to El Pais<\/a>.) Crespo Dominguez remains at large and is believed to have fled to Morocco. An international alert has been issued for him, according to Spain\u2019s Euro Weekly News<\/a>.<\/p>\n Also in mid-February, Spanish police carried out a special operation against a hashish ring that was apparently using helicopters to ferry in product from Morocco, by Euro Weekly News\u2019 report<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n A total of 18 arrests were reported \u2014 including two Serbian ex-military helicopter pilots, by Euro News Weekly\u2019s account. The arrested pilots were said to be experts in night flying at low altitude and without lights to avoid detection. Spain\u2019s Guardia Civil seized two helicopters in what was dubbed \u201cOperation Andalus\u00eda-Serrania.\u201d<\/p>\n The investigation began last year following the discovery of a helicopter hidden on a\u00a0finca<\/em>\u00a0(estate) in the mountains of Andalusia\u2019s Serrania de Ronda. A second helicopter was discovered in December as it was carrying out a suspected \u201cnarco-flight\u201d from Sevilla to Morocco. After that, the Guardia went into action, executing four searches in the provinces of Malaga and Sevilla, according to\u00a0Euro News Weekly.<\/p>\n Moroccan forces have also been carrying out interceptions at sea. In the most recent, a unit of Morocco\u2019s Royal Marines seized a vessel that was sailing in a \u201cforbidden zone\u201d off the coastal city of Tangier. A mixed crew of Spanish and Moroccan nationals was taken into custody, and an investigation is underway to determine if they are connected to the \u201cconsiderable quantities\u201d of hashish found near the \u201cincident site\u201d \u2014 presumably, they had dumped their haul when they realized they were about to boarded. Meanwhile, they are being held on \u201cillegal navigation\u201d charges, according to\u00a0Morocco World News<\/a>.<\/p>\n All this is particularly tragic, as Morocco seemed to be tentatively finding its way out of the \u201cdrug war\u201d dystopia just last year, with parliament considering\u00a0proposals to legalize cannabis cultivation<\/a> \u2014 at least for medicinal and industrial purposes. Advocates argued this was the best way to daylight what is already a mainstay of Morocco\u2019s economy, and wean it away from the narco-gangs.<\/p>\n But last August,\u00a0Ilyas El-Omari, a leader of the progressive opposition bloc in parliament and the main advocate of the legalization proposals, was\u00a0abruptly forced to step down<\/a>. He represented the Rif Mountains, Morocco\u2019s hashish heartland. His resignation came after King Mohammed VI gave a speech implying he was behind a wave of angry youth protest that had swept the Rif in recent months.\u00a0Being called out by the king (even if not by name) is a serious thing in Morocco, and El-Omari said he stepped down to preserve social peace. But legalization efforts have since languished.<\/p>\n TELL US,<\/strong> did you know about the hashish networks in Morocco and Spain?<\/p>\n The post Spain and Morocco Crackdown on Hashish Networks<\/a> appeared first on Cannabis Now<\/a>.<\/p>\n
Over the past few weeks, authorities in Morocco and Spain have unleashed sweeps against hashish smuggling networks, arresting hundreds. One ring was reportedly using Serbian ex-military helicopter pilots to ferry product across the Strait of Gibraltar. This heightened militarization is especially disappointing, as a legalization initiative in Morocco \u2014 theContinue Reading<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":190,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"false","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[50,240,1831,35,3549,491],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24170"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/190"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=24170"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24170\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":24171,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24170\/revisions\/24171"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=24170"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=24170"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=24170"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}\n
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\nRead More: Spain and Morocco Crackdown on Hashish Networks<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"