Boarding of drugs vessel followed British customs tip-off, says officer

A tip-off from British customs resulted in the detention of the crew of the Posidonia, the 70 foot converted trawler involved in yesterday's £15 million drugs seizure off west Cork, according to a senior naval officer.

Lieut Cdr Hugh Tully, Naval Service press officer at Haulbowline, said the vessel was bound for Britain but had changed course earlier this week.

Weather conditions off the Fastnet Rock meant there was a 50-50 chance of successfully boarding the vessel with an armed naval and customs search party, he said.

Lieut Cdr Tully confirmed that the Posidonia had been on a list of vessels under surveillance, using the North Africa-Europe route.

Speaking at a maritime conference hosted by the Nautical Institute in Malahide, Dublin, yesterday, Lieut Cdr Tully said that a drug trafficker's chance of landing undetected shipments in Ireland was over 20 times greater than on other European coastlines.

"Significant" undetected shipments of arms are also believed to have been landed, he said. Ireland's European neighbours spend four times more than this State does on maritime security and policing for sea areas half the size of Ireland's, he said.

International intelligence and police-based reports suggest that this coast will continue to be a major trans-shipment area for drugs importation, he said.

Were it not for variables such as weather and mechanical failure, some substantial drugs seizures might not have taken place at all, he said.

The success of arms operations such as the Claudia in 1973 and the Marita Anne in 1984 must be balanced against "the numerous significant shipments which were not intercepted", he told the conference.

The strength of policing in other waters had increased the attraction of the Irish coast, he maintained.

Statements made by defendants during the Brime trial in 1994 suggested that the level of maritime patrolling off the Belgian, British and French coasts made it unsafe to traffic narcotics.

Failure to meet international and national responsibilities in a sea area 13 times the size of the State was an effective surrender of sovereignty, Lieut Cdr Tully said.

He listed other threats to the State's sovereignty and resources, including "fraud and over-exploitation" of fisheries to the extent that some fisheries had already collapsed in certain areas, threats to environmental security and increasing conflict between fishing vessels.

Lieut Cdr Tully said that the development of an organisation modelled on the US coastguard was the "optimum, no-frills" option best suited to this coastal State's requirements and responsibilities.

"Our seas do not belong to the adults of today and should not be managed on the basis of short-term considerations of economic gain or political power," he said.

Also speaking at the Nautical Institute seminar were the Minister for the Marine and Natural Resources, Dr Woods; Dr Peter Heffernan, chief executive officer of the Marine Institute; Mr Alex Mullin of the Irish Chamber of Shipping; and Capt Geoff Livingstone, chief of operations of the Irish Marine Emergency Service.