Bertie Ahern (Dublin Central, Fianna Fail)

Much of the intelligence in this regard comes from Interpol and from other sources.

As for the quantity, an incident of this nature leads to speculation about successful and undetected attempts to import drugs. While I cannot state whether such attempts have taken place, when one considers an attempt of this nature one may assume it was unlikely to have been the first. Although the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime estimates that global seizures of cocaine amount to 44% of cocaine production, I do not know how one estimates such a figure.

As it has done, the Government will continue to provide all the resources necessary to the Naval Service, Revenue and the agencies involved in order that they can take all reasonable steps to counteract this deadly trade. However, it has been 15 years since this issue regarding the need for greater co-operation and resources to try to cover the coastline was debated at European level. Obviously, the various coastlines across Europe have been used and seizures have taken place in half a dozen countries in the past 12 months.

As for the amount of cocaine in particular coming into society generally, including Ireland, and being used here, most of the intelligence suggests that such very large consignments find their way into Europe. While the initial view in this instance is that it could have been bound for the United Kingdom, I am informed this cannot be substantiated and it will take some time before that will happen. Two people have been arrested, there are other suspects in the west Cork region and Garda investigations are continuing.

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