English

Operation Hunter: Citizens of Syria and Turkey arrested for smuggling weapons and 200kg of cocaine

“In a successfully conducted international operation of Montenegrin police and US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), in coordination with the special state prosecutor, these two persons have been identified and located by applying special investigative methods and, after certain investigative measures and actions, they have been arrested today”, public relations consultant of the Police Directorate Tamara Popovic said at a press conference.

Karych and Mehmet are in extradition custody, since they have been arrested based on a warrant issued by the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York on suspicion of smuggling weapons and 200 kilograms of cocaine at international level.

As Popovic said, these crimes were not committed on the territory of Montenegro, but in the United States and other countries.

“Montenegrin police and the DEA agency, together with our prosecutor’s office, have undertaken activities within the international operation Hunter since September 2015. Since then, they have collected pieces of evidence indicating that Karych and Mehmet dealt with procurement and smuggling of large quantities of destructive weapons and cocaine, for a criminal organization involved in the smuggling of narcotics at the international level, which operates in Mexico, the US and Western Europe”, Popovic said.

According to her, this international investigation represents a continuation of the successful cooperation between the Montenegrin police and the US DEA agency and another confirmation of professional and partnership relations between our police and the agency in a common struggle against modern forms of international crime.

Popovic reminded that the Police Directorate and the DEA agency, in cooperation with the Romanian police and in coordination and upon an order of the prosecutor’s office on the territory of our country, arrested two Romanian citizens and one Italian citizen in December 2014.

Interpol Washington, the U.S. National Central Bureau, issued an international warrant against them upon the orders of the US District Court – the Southern District of New York.

“The warrant was issued within the criminal proceedings against them in the United States, since they were suspected of committing crimes conspiracy to kill US officers and employees and conspiracies in order to provide material support or resources to a foreign terrorist organisation”, Popovic said.

As she explained, in the indictment of the District Court – Southern District of New York, they were charged as international weapons smugglers of creating a criminal organisation in order to sell a large amount of military weapons to a foreign terrorist organisation – the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), in order to murder US citizens in Colombia.

“These individuals were extradited to the United States in February 2015”, Popovic said.

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