By Sierra Leone Telegraph: 5 May 2026:
Police in Spain have made what they describe as a “record-breaking cocaine seizure in the Atlantic”, as part of an ongoing crackdown on international drug trafficking, according to SKY News report.
The cocaine filled vessel, believed to be 90m (295-feet)-long and registered in the Comoros Islands, was heading for the Mediterranean after leaving Freetown, the capital of Sierra Leone, on 22 April, the force told Sky News.
It was intercepted by the Spanish police unit, an elite team that investigates serious crimes, off the coast of the Western Sahara region, near the city of Dakhla, and then escorted to the port of Las Palmas in Gran Canaria on Sunday night, where it is being held by a Spanish court.
Officers from Spain’s Guardia Civil’s Central Operational Unit said they found between 35,000 and 40,000kg (35-40 tonnes) of the banned drug on the cargo ship off the coast of northwest Africa.
The cocaine haul is equivalent to about two thousand large suitcases.
This news comes as the President of Sierra Leone – Julius Maada Bio and his wife, left Freetown for London. It is not clear whether the visit to London is connected to the cocaine seizure.
The British government is a major contributor to the government of Sierra Leone’s annual budget through foreign aid. And there is speculation President Bio has been summoned to London to answer questions about this massive cocaine shipment from Freetown.
The Guardia Civil, speaking to SKY News on condition of anonymity, as their investigation is ongoing, was acting as part of a large crackdown on international drug trafficking, overseen by Spain’s High Court.
Officers have arrested 23 people who are mostly Filipino, Angolan and Dutch nationals.
News of Sierra Leone acting as a major global cocaine trans-shipment hub has become all too frequent, after authorities in Holland sentenced Bolle Jos – a dangerous Dutch cocaine baron who is married to the daughter of President Bio and believed to be living under cover in Sierra Leone.
Bolle Jos Leijdekkers was sentenced in absentia to 24 years in prison on 25 June 2024 by a Rotterdam court for smuggling more than seven tonnes of cocaine.
Spain’s Interior Minister Fernando Grande-Marlaska told reporters in Madrid, including AFP, that the seizure “was one of the biggest, not only nationally but internationally,” without providing further details.
