FRENCH POLICE ARREST 16 INVOLVED IN INTERNATIONAL DRUG RING

Copyright A9 1998 Nando.net Copyright A9 1998 AFP

NICE, France- French police said Monday they had arrested 16 people from
Colombia, France and Aruba, in the Dutch West Indies, after cracking an
international ring of drug traffickers operating on the French Riviera.

The arrests followed the seizure last week by police aboard two French navy
ships of a sailing ship off Venezuela as it was taking on board 700
kilograms of Colombian cocaine (1,500 pounds) of Colombian cocaine.

Nine French nationals were arrested in southern France, along with two more
aboard the sailing ship Novaia and two French and two Colombians with
Mexican passports on Aruba.

The suspected French mastermind, Eric Jourdan, was detained in Venezuela as
he tried to cross the border into Guayana with fake Belgian papers.

It took investigators two years to bust the ring after the arrest in 1996 of
an Italian at the French-Italian border who had been carrying seven
kilograms of cocaine.

Police expected more arrests to be made in Spain.

Checked-by: Melodi Cornett