Megaoperation "Ura"/ Wiretaps in SKYECC, drug money was transported through buses

2025-05-21 11:27:00, Aktualitet CNA

New details have emerged from the mega-anti-drug operation Ura by SPAK and the Italian Antimafia.

The investigations carried out by the DIA of Bari between September 2021 and June 2022 have made it possible to collect evidence against suspects, Albanian and Italian, who belong in Italy to two criminal groups, recognized as such by the GIP of Bari, as well as, in Albania, part of a powerful organized criminal group, recognized as such by the Judge of Tirana, based in Durrës.

The DIA, in relation to the large quantities of heroin and cocaine moved, starting in 2016, between the Balkans, Northern Europe, South America and Puglia, has documented the existence of a community of interests between the criminal group in Albania, responsible, at a transnational level, for the trafficking and transfer of drugs, and two criminal associations operating in Bari which, in turn, after carrying out the "cutting" and packaging operations, supplied in bulk to organizations in Bari, Brindisi and Lecce interested in obtaining high-quality heroin and cocaine coming respectively from Turkey and Latin America.

The complex investigations, carried out with telephone interceptions, environmental surveillance, video recordings and surveillance, protection and control services, supported by the extrapolation and analysis of encrypted conversations obtained from the SKYECC platform, as well as by the statements of three justice collaborators, have allowed, among other things, to document, in relation to the narcotic substance sent to Bari mainly from Albania and Northern Europe, countless supplies (255 kilograms of "pure" heroin and "pure" cocaine) carried out through international couriers.

In the same context, continuous money transfers from Puglia to Albania were discovered, to pay for drugs sold "in bulk", which were carried out through international bus drivers, whose illegal transactions, for a total amount of 4.5 million euros, allowed the Albanian authorities to contest the crime of money laundering.

In this context, several drug money transfers were discovered, which were carried out in Bari, for amounts exceeding half a million euros; the transfer of over 500 thousand dollars from Albania to Latin America, paid as an advance for the purchase of a shipment of 500 kilograms of cocaine sent from Guayaquil (Ecuador); indications of abuse of office that occurred on Albanian territory.