Spanish police on Tuesday mentioned that they had uncovered a technologically subtle and “maze-like” underground tunnel used to smuggle tonnes of cannabis from Morocco to Spain’s North African exclave of Ceuta and Europe.
The investigation discovered the positioning in Ceuta hid underneath an industrial warehouse that was protected by pumping and soundproofing methods to keep away from detection, police mentioned in an announcement.
The underside of the three-level tunnel, which led on to Morocco, resembled “a maze typical of a mine”, outfitted with trolleys “that moved on a rail system of complicated development and attribute of completely designed feats of engineering”.
The bales of cannabis had been ready and saved on the center degree, from the place they had been lifted “because of a system of cranes and pulleys designed to maneuver heavy masses”, the police mentioned.
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Your complete construction is nineteen metres (62 toes) deep, however investigators can’t decide how lengthy the tunnel is “as a result of it’s flooded”, the officer answerable for the operation, Antonio MartÃnez, defined at a press convention.
Picture displaying an entrance to the complicated underground ‘maze’ designed to carry tonnes of medicine into Spain. Picture: Nationwide Police/AFP
The tunnel, measuring 1.2 metres excessive and 80 centimetres broad, was “well-equipped” and “purpose-built” by “an especially highly effective organisation” that contacted different teams to move the drug in speedboats and fishing vessels, he added.
Police started their investigation in February 2025, seizing greater than 17 tonnes of cannabis and €1.4 million ($1.6 million) in money in varied operations in Ceuta and mainland Spain over a number of months.
In addition they made 27 arrests, together with the community’s two suspected leaders.
One in all them, based mostly in Morocco and held on March 26, can be suspected of operating one other drug tunnel police dismantled in Ceuta final yr.
Spain’s shut ties with Latin America and proximity to Morocco, a prime hashish producer, make it a key entry level for medicine into Europe.
Its small Mediterranean coastal exclaves of Ceuta and Melilla, adjoining to Morocco, share the European Union’s solely land borders with Africa.
