MAJOR SHIPMENT OF COCAINE SEIZED ON BULK CARRIER

Coastguard officers apparently acting on a tip-off boarded a Cypriot-
flagged bulk carrier at a port in western Evia and found 248 kilos of
cocaine yesterday morning.

According to reports, the cocaine was stashed in pipes inside the engine
room of the "Kleovoulos of Rhodes".

Coastguard officials said the vessel, owned by the shipping firm "Celestial
Maritime Corp," had sailed from Colombia for the port of Aliveri with a
shipment of coal. Once unloading of the coal began, divers and drug squad
officers boarded the 65,000 dwt vessel and found the cocaine.

Eight Greek and 33 foreign merchant seamen were arrested and the vessel was
impounded.

Marijuana seized in western Greece

Drug squad officers from Corfu and Igoumenitsa have arrested two Albanians
and seized over 150 kilos of marijuana.

According to press sources, the police two months ago received information
that Albanian drug traffickers were using a speedboat to smuggle large
quantities of marijuana into the country via the west coast of Corfu or
southern Thesprotia.

Late last night, police following a suspect arrested both him and another
another whom he met in the dark near a beach in the community of Vatos. The
two Albanians were found to be in possession of 153 kilos of marijuana
wrapped in 17 packets.

The two were named as Stara Bakiou, 27, a permanent resident of Corfu, and
Thanasi Naso, a construction worker from Sarande.

In an unrelated incident, five illegal immigrants from Albania, four of them
minors, were arrested in a rural area of Florina prefecture in northern
Greece after being found in possession of 1.3 kilos of hashish.

Checked-by: Rolf Ernst