“There are a number of nominals [criminals] influential to the UK drug trade who were living abroad at the time of the EncroChat operations who are still at large, in places such as Spain, Thailand, Dubai and the Netherlands,” said Saggers.
“These senior people need to be rounded up with priority, otherwise they will continue to build their international networks from afar, and target the UK.”
Saggers said that although the amount of criminals taken out by EncroChat was significant, the amount of drugs seized was less so.
While courts and press reports have seen a series of high-end traffickers convicted for smuggling large amounts of drugs, Saggers points out that most were caught with relatively small amounts of drugs on the day police raided them, providing only a snapshot of their prior activity reflected within encrypted conversations.
“People would perhaps expect the impact of the EncroChat arrests to have stifled the supply of cocaine in Europe. But there’s no signs of a reduction in cocaine purity.”
This he said was due to continued high demand for cocaine in Europe and record cocaine production in South America. Colombia is now producing 1,200 tons of cocaine a year, three times more than it was in the 1990s.
Saggers points out that the nine tons of cocaine seized by UK police, over two years as a result of the EncroChat busts, makes up less than one percent of Colombia’s annual production.
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