Ireland not a ‘soft touch’ for drug smugglers, says Varadkar, following two large seizures

Ireland is not a “soft touch” for drug smugglers, Taoiseach Leo Varadkar has said in the wake of two large seizures this week.

“I honestly don’t believe so. We’ve seen two very significant seizures in the last couple of days and I want to compliment the Revenue, the Garda Síochána, our Defence Forces for making sure that those seizures happened.

A discovery in Rosslare was made by Revenue officers on Friday and consisted of some 288.6kg of herbal cannabis, 72.8kg of cannabis resin and 3.3kg of cocaine.

The estimated value of the seizure is €6,443,640. The haul was found using a mobile X-ray scanner and with the help of detector dog Jasper.

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A man in his 40s was detained and is currently being held at a Co Wexford Garda station under Section 2 of the Criminal Justice (Drug Trafficking) Act 1996.

Investigations are ongoing.

A consignment of drugs believed to be crystal meth worth €32.8m was also seized on Friday at Cork Port.

Gardaí believe the shipment was owned by a Mexican cartel and was transiting through Ireland, potentially bound for Mexico.

The busts “send out the message to people around the world that we have very robust operations in place”, Mr Varadkar said.

“In Rosslare for example, there’s the Revenue’s X-ray scanner, and there’s sniffer dogs, in particular Jasper, who was a crucial in in in identifying these illegal narcotics come into the country.”

He said no country has been able to completely stop the smuggling of drugs but that the Government has significantly increased the resources of the Garda and Revenue in this regard.