A yacht seized in French Polynesia in January has inadvertently been auctioned off with cocaine onboard.

La Depeche de Tahiti said the police sold off the yacht Mojito almost a year after seizing it with more than 800 kilograms of cocaine in Arue.

The paper said when the buyer did a thorough clean-up of the yacht he found another kilogram of cocaine.

It said he gave the drugs to the police who added it to the more than two tonnes of cocaine seized this year which was last week transferred to New Caledonia for destruction in the furnaces of the SLN nickel smelter.

The Mojito was originally registered in Fort-de France, the capital of the French Caribbean department of Martinique.

The arrested skipper was flown to France.

The Mojito was seized just days after the French navy seized more than 400 kilograms of cocaine on a yacht near the Marquesas islands.

The drug shipments were believed to be destined for Australia and New Zealand.