Three men will appear before the courts in Dublin this morning in connection with the discovery on Saturday of cocaine with an estimated street value of €210,000 and €45,000 in cash.
The drugs and money were seized by gardaí when they moved in on the three men as they were about to complete a drug deal outside a bar beside Blanchardstown shopping centre in west Dublin.
One of the men is a 25-year-old drug dealer from the Blanchardstown area who is closely associated with two brothers who have been linked to a number of gangland killings in west Dublin in the past 18 months. Gardaí believe this man was collecting the drugs for the two brothers.
He was about to hand over €45,000 in cash as part-payment for two of the three kilogrammes of cocaine which the other two men had brought to the drop-off point.
Gardaí from Blanchardstown and from the Garda National Drugs Unit moved in as the drugs and money were changing hands at 8.30pm.
The three men, aged 25, 26 and 32, were arrested at the scene. They were taken to Blanchardstown Garda station, where they were being detained last night.
Garda sources said charges in relation to the drugs seizure had already been put to the men at the station.
All three will appear before Dublin District Court this morning to answer the charges.
The 25-year-old man is very closely linked with two brothers who are suspected of the gangland murder of the two Glennon brothers from Blanchardstown.
Mark Glennon (32) was shot dead outside his home on Hazelwood Crescent, Hartstown, last September. Andrew Glennon (30) was gunned down in April 2005 in Clonee, Co Meath.
Both were killed by a gang headed by brothers linked to Saturday's drugs haul. All of the men were once members of the Westies drugs gang. This group has split into a number of factions and its former leaders, Shane Coates and Stephen Sugg, have been missing presumed dead in Spain for the last two years.
