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Seven Brits have been arrested in Spain following a record seizure of cocaine bound for the UK.

Three tonnes of the Class A drug - worth an estimated £500 million - were confiscated from an industrial warehouse and a van in the north west province of Pontevedra in Galicia following a tip-off from Britain’s National Crime Agency.

Police say the Brits, held in the province of Malaga, had arranged to buy the cocaine from Dutch traffickers who had smuggled it into Spain from south America.

Spanish detectives described the men as members of an “important group of drugs traffickers based on the Costa del Sol.”

Five of the Brits, aged between 31 and 59, are from Liverpool including the alleged 59-year-old leader of the drugs gang.

(Image: Spanish National Police Dept Handout)

A 41-year-old from Kingston upon Thames in Surrey and a 50-year-old from Thornbury, Gloucestershire, were also held.

It is understood all three tonnes of cocaine , the biggest land seizure of cocaine by Spain’s National Police force in Galicia since 1999, were due to be taken to Britain.

The drugs found in the van had been hidden inside a specially-adapted false roof and the traffickers had put an engine in the back of the vehicle to pretend they were carrying a legal load.

Weapons including a loaded 9mm pistol as well as cash were also seized.

A source close to the inquiry said: “The entire three tonnes of cocaine were due to end up on the streets of Britain but they were going to be transported in parts.

“The buyers were British and had already made a down-payment of €500,000 (£365,000) for the first 700 kilos of cocaine found in a specially-adapted roof inside the van.”

A total of 12 people were held as part of the operation - including the seven Brits, three Dutch sellers and two Spaniards hired to transport the drugs from north west Spain to Malaga.

The arrests took place last month but details were only revealed at a press conference in Madrid.

(Image: Spanish National Police Dept Handout)

Police described how elite GEO police trained in dealing with terrorist attacks and hostage taking intercepted the van being used to take the first consignment of drugs from Pontevedra to Malaga.

A spokesman said: “A lead car driven by one of the two Spaniards that acted as lookout for the van driver tried to ram a police vehicle in a failed attempt to avoid arrest.

“Several bricks of cocaine weighing around 700 kilos hidden in a false roof behind the driver’s seat.

“The remaining 3,000 kilos were found in a warehouse in an industrial estate in Barro, Pontevedra.

“At the same time officers arrested the Dutch traffickers in the nearby city of Santiago de Compostela and eight people in Malaga including the seven Brit members of the gang who had bought the cocaine for its subsequent distribution.”

As well as the drugs, police also seized nearly £900,000 in euros as well as the pistol, four cars and a motorbike.

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A police spokesman said the two suspected Dutch traffickers - arrested at stunning five-star Santiago de Compostela hotel Hostal Dos Reis Catolicos on the city’s famous Obradoiro Square - had drawn attention to themselves by “throwing 500 euro notes around as if they were water.”

The alleged leader of the Costa-del-Sol based British drugs gang is thought to have met with the Dutchmen in the hotel.

National Police General Director Ignacio Cosido told a press conference in Madrid: “This is the biggest land seizure of cocaine in Galicia since 1999.”

Police said in a subsequent press release: “National Police have smashed an important international organisation dedicated to the maritime transport of cocaine from south America to Europe.

“The operation has resulted in the arrest of 12 people and the seizure of 3,000 kilos of cocaine which was going to be bought by an important group of drugs traffickers based on the Costa del Sol.

“The twelve detainees include the Spanish nationals tasked with the transport of the drugs as well as the sellers and buyers of the cocaine who were Dutch and British respectively.”

(Image: Spanish National Police Dept Handout)

Galicia is an important entry point for cocaine from south America.

Galician drug barons first opened routes into Spain via the region with the Colombian Cali and Medellin cartels in the 1980s.

Spain’s proximity to north Africa and its close ties to south America have helped make it the gateway into Europe for cannabis and cocaine.

The drugs seized in Galicia in this new operation are thought to have come from Colombia.

British Costa del Sol-based villains became major players in the multi-billion-pound drugs trafficking industry operating through Spain after early forays into cannabis smuggling by the first waves of gangsters in the late seventies and early eighties.

Last month six men from Liverpool were arrested after police in the port of Valencia, eastern Spain, discovered 1.5 tonnes of cocaine disguised as wooden pallets.

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In November a Brit described by Spanish police as Europe’s number one drugs trafficker was arrested at his luxury villa on the Costa del Sol.

Robert Dawes, 44, from Nottingham, was held on a European arrest warrant issued by a French court related to the discovery of 1.3 tonnes of cocaine at Paris’ Charles De Gaulle airport in September 2013.

The seizure was the largest ever made in France.

Dawes is now being held in jail in France after being extradited following a hearing in Madrid.