The SSU and the law enforcement agencies of Romania and Germany have completed a multi-stage special operation to dismantle a large-scale channel for smuggling hard drugs from Iran to the European Union.

As a result of the activities that lasted over a year, the operation not only shut down the channel but also detained the organizer of the drug trafficking in Romania.

The special operation began in September 2022, when the SSU and the National Police of Ukraine detained two foreign drug couriers in Odesa. They were trying to transit almost 186 kg of Iranian heroin to Western Europe through Ukraine.

To disguise the narcotics, the criminals hid them in double-bottomed boxes containing 16 tons of dates. The value of the seized batch of drugs reached USD 11 mln at black market prices.

At that point, the Service established that the two arrested couriers were part of a large transnational drug gang. To expose its organizer, living in one of the EU states, the SSU carried out additional operational and investigative actions in cooperation with European partners.

As a result, the location of the main suspect was identified, his crimes -documented, and he was apprehended.

According to the investigation, the man developed a route for smuggling drugs by sea through Odesa port. After its blockade due to russia’s aggression, he switched to Romanian ports and transported narcotics to Ukraine by land.

Currently, an investigation is underway in Romania against the detained organizer.

SSU investigators served two of his couriers, detained in Ukraine, notices of suspicion under Article 305.3 of the CCU (smuggling of narcotic drugs, psychotropic substances, their analogues or precursors or counterfeit medicines in especially large amounts).

The court has chosen custody as a measure of restraint for the suspects, who are facing up to 12 years in prison with confiscation of property.

The SSU conducted the operation jointly with the National Police Department for Combating Drug Crime under the procedural supervision of the Prosecutor General’s Office and in cooperation with the State Customs Service and law enforcement agencies of Germany and Romania, as well as Europol and Eurojust.