Spain's National Police, alongside the US DEA and Dutch police, dismantled an operational structure of the Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG) in the country. The operation led to 20 arrests, including Mexicans, Italians, and Colombians, and the seizure of large quantities of drugs and cash. This strike aims to halt the cartel's expansion in Europe via key ports.
The operation, coordinated by the Central Investigating Court Number 2 of the National Court and the Special Anti-Drug Prosecutor's Office, began after small cocaine seizures in Bilbao and Valencia over a year ago. These seizures revealed packages with a double logo, unusual in drug trafficking, leading agents to industrial farms in central Spain where the drugs were coordinated, stored, and guarded.
The CJNG smuggled cocaine and methamphetamines from Latin America, mainly Costa Rica, hidden in large-tonnage industrial machinery. The drugs were stored in farms in the Sierra de Madrid and Ávila, with distribution coordinated from a farm near La Adrada in Ávila, connected to Bilbao and Valencia via modified vehicles. For international shipments, properties in Talavera de la Reina, Toledo, were used, with ties to the Neapolitan Camorra in Italy. In September, a cocaine shipment was detected to the right-hand man of Raffaele Imperiale, a Camorra drug trafficker arrested in 2021 in Dubai.
Among the detainees are four Mexicans, cartel emissaries wearing 'Peaky Blinders'-style caps who stayed in Spain only three or four months; a Colombian 'santero' with a superstitious hat to protect shipments; an Italian and a Colombian deemed high-value DEA targets; and a Spanish businessman with no prior record who provided logistical support and laundered money by buying silver ingots and coins worth up to 2,000 euros per kilo.
The seizure included 1,870 kilos of cocaine, 375 kilos of amphetamine, 275,000 euros in cash, cryptocurrencies worth 15,000 dollars, 70 kilos of silver, three short firearms, and 15 vehicles. The network was exploring routes through the ports of Oporto in Portugal and Rotterdam in the Netherlands, and involved intercepting a container from Costa Rica. This is not the first strike against the CJNG abroad; in March 2025, a lab in Kenya was dismantled. The cartel, designated a terrorist organization by the United States in 2025, has expanded beyond Mexico, including fuel trafficking.