Man held as £2m of ecstasy is seized

A man who served a lengthy jail term in Britain for a terrorist offence carried out in the early 1970s was being questioned last night at Lucan Garda station in Dublin after being found in possession of ecstasy tablets with an estimated street value of more than £2 million.

The 46-year-old man, originally from the north side of Dublin, was arrested early yesterday morning in Patrick Street in Dublin city centre after a surveillance operation which is believed to have started early in the week.

He was released from prison in Britain in the late 1980s and returned to Ireland. He has been living in the south side of the city with his wife and family for a number of years.

Gardai from the National Drugs Unit, which carried out the operation, stopped his car at about 7.45 a.m. The drugs are believed to have been recently shipped into the city and were to meet demand at Christmas in what gardai described as the "home market".

More than 200,000 tablets were found in the car. The "street" price of ecstasy is about £10 a tablet, although this haul is believed to be high-purity MDMA, so the price could be £12 to £15.

Republican figures in Dublin have taken a strong public stance against drug-dealing, especially heroin. In February 1996 the IRA issued a "hitlist" of names of people accused of dealing in drugs.

There are no reliable statistics on the level of ecstasy use in Ireland. In Britain it is estimated that up to one million tablets are consumed every week. The tablets in the latest haul are believed to have been manufactured in eastern Europe and shipped through Amsterdam.

Gardai carried out a follow-up search of the man's house after the seizure, and no further arrests were made. The man can be held for up to seven days under drug-trafficking legislation.

The haul represents the largest seizure of ecstasy this year, and more than 10 times the amount of ecstasy seized in 1997. More than 55,000 tablets have been recovered in three separate seizures in Dublin so far this year and a further 50,000 were seized in Ovens, Co Cork, in February.