Maltese shipper ‘involved in major drug smuggling ring’

A Maltese shipping agent is believed to be involved in a multimillion euro drug smuggling operation that was slapped with international sanctions last week. 

The operation is suspected of having shipped narcotics from Libya to Italy and other parts of Europe through a bunkering spot just off the Maltese coast.

Organised crime groups in southern Italy, Libya, Albania and Montenegro are believed to have played a part in the racket.

Sources told Times of Malta that an inter-agency task force has been investigating the international organised crime network behind the operation for the past year-and- a-half and has uncovered suspicious communication between the group and officials in Maltese state entities.

Multiple sources confirmed that those entities include the local police. 

The racket was thrown into the limelight last week when the United States imposed sanctions on companies and individuals it says form part of it.

They include Libyan national Faysal al-Wadi and two of his Libyan associates on allegations of smuggling. Malta-based company Alwefaq Ltd was also slapped with sanctions. 

The US Treasury Department said Wadi and his cargo vessel Maraya had been smuggling fuel and...