Ireland, the EU and the Global Cocaine Trade

The quantities of cocaine seized by European member states and their various law enforcement agencies over the course of the last 8 years is nothing short of breath-taking.

The European Drug Report 2024 published by EUDA (The European Union Drugs Agency-formerly known as the European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction) leave us in no doubt about this.

The Report notes for example that 2022 was the sixth year in a row that EU Member States reported a record amount of cocaine seized, amounting to 323 tonnes with Belgium, Spain and the Netherlands reporting the highest volumes of seizures, reflecting their importance as entry points for cocaine trafficked to Europe.

This adaptability is particularly evident in how DTOs exploit Europe’s vast and complex logistical infrastructure. Major ports such as Rotterdam and Hamburg, alongside Antwerp and Spanish ports, continue to serve as key entry points. But traffickers have diversified their routes, often using smaller ports or overland routes through less scrutinized border crossings, complicating detection efforts. This adaptability is also reflected in their use of technology, with encrypted communication tools, drones for surveillance, and even semi-submersible vessels becoming part of their arsenal.

EUDA also reports that in 2023, the quantity of cocaine seized in Antwerp, Europe’s second-largest seaport, rose to 116 tonnes from 110 tonnes in 2022. This reflected a trend of year on year increases in the volume of cocaine being seized there from 2016.

In 2023, Spain reported its largest ever seizure of cocaine (9.5 tonnes) in a single shipment, concealed in bananas originating from Ecuador.

Despite these commendable successes the trend in terms of demand for cocaine in both its powder and ‘crack’ form appears to be growing exponentially among the populations of Europe irrespective of class or status.

Confirmation of this can be found in the extensive research literature produced by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC). Indeed, the most recently available UNODC data on the local dynamics and global challenges arising from the cocaine trade confirms that while the COVID-19 pandemic had a disruptive effect on drug markets when international travel was severely curtailed, this blip in the market has had effectively no impact on longer-term trends with the global supply of cocaine now at record levels.

According to UNODC global estimates, almost 2,000 tons of cocaine are produced annually, continuing what it has described as a dramatic uptick in manufacture that began in 2014, when the total was less than half of today’s levels.

It is clear then that the scale of the epidemic of cocaine use, and the threat that this represents to the financial, security, and public health realms of member states cannot be overstated.

Clear indicators of this are again provided in the stark findings of the EUDA Report referred to above. The Report estimates, based on 2021 data, that the EU drug market alone has a minimum retail value of at least EUR 31 billion, the vast majority of which is a major income source for organised crime.

This in turn, EUDA says, establishes a profoundly destructive interconnectedness between different illicit drugs, with criminal networks and key brokers and facilitators often engaging in poly-drug criminality such as the trafficking in firearms and money laundering.

The interconnectedness between drug trafficking and criminal networks is also a major and growing source of concern to Irish political leaders, the Irish health service (HSE) and law enforcement.

An excellent and informative analysis of just how serious these issues are in the context of organised crime, modern slavery, human trafficking, and economic crime was recently published in a Report by The Azure Forum for Contemporary Security Strategy, with the support of the British Embassy Dublin, and authored by Dr Alexander Chance.

That Ireland is a key gateway to for the European drug trade can be seen in the significant level of drug seizures during 2023 included a high-profile Joint Task Force operation which resulted in the seizure of over €157 million worth of cocaine being detected onboard the Panamanian registered MV Matthew. Irish military intelligence and European and British intelligence agencies were reportedly of the view that 3,400 kilos of cocaine seized from smaller Spanish and French vessels were likely stocked from the MV Matthew prior to interception by the Irish Army Rangers.

Another notable feature of the Irish illegal drug market is that it has effectively been controlled by a small number of criminal operations, mostly involving, since at least 2018, the so-called Hutch and Kinahan crime gangs. However, as the UNODC has observed, while the cocaine market is still largely controlled by these Irish groups, Albanian organised crime gangs have begun to establish their presence in the country.

In fact, in November 2024 Ireland’s Criminal Assets Bureau disrupted a major Albanian crime group supplying drugs in the west Dublin area while also seizing €400,000 in cash and a quantity of drugs.

The Azure Forum analysis suggests this kind of activity will increase as expanding cocaine use across diverse international user groups in Ireland continues to grow. In addition to this, Azure believes that Ireland’s potential role as a transit country for the UK cocaine is likely to radically increase the potential for violent clashes in on the island of Ireland in the future.

There can be little doubt that the demand for cocaine in Ireland is growing at a deeply alarming rate as are all of the attendant social ills that come with this.

Moreover, as cocaine becomes increasingly available and affordable, its consumption patterns are shifting. While traditionally associated with urban elites and the nightlife scene, cocaine use has permeated into smaller towns and rural communities, spurred by aggressive marketing by drug dealers who capitalize on its perceived glamour and its highly addictive nature. This expansion has placed additional strains on local health services, which often lack the resources to address the complexities of addiction and its societal impacts.

Evidence of this from a health and addiction perspective is clearly presented in the June 2024 Report from Irelands Health Research Board (HRB) on the sustained rise in demand for cocaine treatment services.

While Ireland has robust and effective law enforcement agencies as well as legislation such as the Criminal Justice Act 1994 and Criminal Justice (Drug Trafficking) Act 1996 to assist in the seizure and confiscation of assets derived from drug trafficking, with enhanced penalties for drug-related crimes-the enormity of the challenge from a both a security and health perspective remains daunting.

To be sure, similar challenges exist in almost every other EU member state as they too attempt to respond effectively to a global cocaine trade that is extraordinarily well financed and profoundly adept at breaching security and detection initiatives.

Some states are however responding more effectively than others; a point highlighted at the launch in October 2023, by the European Commission of the EU Roadmap to fight drug trafficking and organised crime, which continues the efforts to implement the EU Strategy on Organised Crime 2021-2025 and the EU Drugs Strategy and Action Plan 2021-2025.

There it was made clear that while some Member States have robust frameworks empowering local authorities to use administrative tools against criminal infiltration, “others are lagging behind in developing such approaches.“

 The focus, according to the Roadmap should now be on dismantling high-risk criminal networks and strengthening cooperation with international partners.

The Roadmap also proposes strengthening the resilience of logistics hubs through a European Ports Alliance as key gateways for the EU’s economic prosperity and the transport of goods across the EU – makes them vulnerable to drug smuggling and exploitation by high-risk criminal networks and their enablers.