British man from South Shields was being held in a Spanish police cell last night

British man from South Shields was being held in a Spanish police cell last night, accused of trying to smuggle more than half a tonne of cocaine through the Mediterranean.The 50-year-old South Shields man, named only by his initials RPJ, was held after undercover officers from both Spain and Portugal intercepted a shipment from the West African country of Gambia.The 514kg of cocaine, concealed in paper handkerchiefs and worth more than £21.5m on the streets, was identified first by Portugese authorities when the freighter arrived in Lisbon.The drugs were in packages found within boxes marked ‘Comfort tissues by Gardenia’ – a South African tissue firm that is not being investigated by police. Yesterday a Spanish police spokesman said: “In the search that took place of the industrial unit, it was verified that there were numerous boxes of handkerchiefs that corresponded to two dispatches done previously, which possibly relate to verifying ‘signals’, regular methodology in drug traffic network systems when they open a new drug entry route.They removed the drugs from the container and then allowed it to be transferred on to a lorry, which continued under surveillance to south eastern Spain, where the 50-year-old was arrested.Detectives said last night they believed the route taken by the smugglers was a new one for shipments from Columbia into Europe.‘Operation Paper’ was launched after customs officials in Lisbon became suspicious of the container when it arrived from Gambia on February 29.After inspecting it, 470 parcels of cocaine were detected, hidden in 352 boxes of the paper handkerchiefs.A simultaneous undercover operation was launched by police in Spain who kept watch on the Torres industrial estate unit in Villajoyosa, Alicante, where the goods were destined.Meanwhile, the truck’s journey from Lisbon to Alicante was shadowed by Spanish police and officers swooped to arrest the Tynesider as he took delivery of the container.When they searched the warehouse, officers also found two other consignments of paper hankerchiefs, indicating that the smugglers had previously carried out two dummy-runs on the new route before sending the cocaine.Officers are not ruling out further arrests in the case, as they continue to analyse the shipping route and associates of ‘RPJ’.Detectives told reporters in Spain they believe the arrested man would have sent the cocaine on to the UK where it would be expected to fetch £21,588,000 on the streets.“The operation is still open and further arrests are not discounted, since documentation obtained in the registers is been analysed in the hope of identifying other members of the traffic network.”

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