Barcelona, the fifth largest port for cocaine inflows in Europe

BarcelonaA dog persistently sniffs a shipping container filled with sacks of cocoa. A Civil Guard officer guides it while Customs Surveillance officers examine it. The container comes from Ecuador, and the objective is to find a bag of hidden cocaine. The 70-kilogram sacks are stacked on top of each other, without pallets, making surveillance even more difficult. Everything must be done by hand. The dog doesn't bark or sit: for now, it's clean. At another terminal in the port, Customs Surveillance officers open the doors of another container. It's a quick gesture, but it happens slowly. "This one is quite likely carrying drugs," they warn. It comes from Brazil, and there are a multitude of boxes of sewing thread. They climb in, search, open, but only thread and more thread appear. They touch the boxes with some kind of marker. It's called cocatest. Also negative woman.

This scene is repeated several times a day in the port of Barcelona. The Catalan infrastructure stretches for more than 12 kilometers and thousands of ships carrying up to 16,000 containers are unloaded. In one year, almost four million of these shipments have passed through Barcelona's docks, permanently leaving the aerial image of a Tetris puzzle of overlapping containers. Barcelona is already the eighth port in Europe for freight transit. However, it ranks even higher in drug trafficking: in 2024, it was the fifth port for cocaine entry into Europe, according to data from the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), data to which ARA has had access.

In fact, Spain leads this ranking: in first place is the port of Algeciras, with 35 tons handled in one year. Next come the ports of Antwerp, Belgium, with 21 tons; Sines, Portugal, with 18 tons; and Southampton, United Kingdom, with 12 tons. Barcelona closes the list. top five with 10 tons. However, in the ranking of the 30 ports with the most drug seizures, Tarragona also appears at number 21, an infrastructure on the rise among criminal groups. Spain's prominence in cocaine trafficking is absolute: nine of the 30 main drug entry ports are in Spain, and the nine largest seizures in 2024 were also on the Iberian Peninsula.

"Barcelona is getting stronger"

It's no surprise that the Iberian Peninsula is one of the gateways for drugs into Europe. However, times are changing. "Until recently, Barcelona wasn't so important, but that's all changing now. More and more drugs are arriving. Before, the port of Valencia dominated, and now Barcelona is gaining strength. Barcelona could already be ahead," Thomas Pietschmann, a researcher at the UNODC, told ARA. He added that drug traffickers have discovered it's better to use new ports to avoid the police pressure that has been imposed on more traditional ones, and Barcelona, ​​along with Genoa (Italy) and Southampton (United Kingdom), is one of the cities they've targeted.

According to data from the Tax Agency, to which ARA has had access, in the last two years, Customs Surveillance has seized cocaine in 42 containers unloaded at the port of Barcelona. Where did these shipments come from? The answer is always found in South or Central America. Ecuador's ports are the exit route for cocaine produced in Colombia, Peru, and Bolivia.In fact, in 2023, 21 containers of cocaine were seized at the port of Barcelona, ​​​​and up to 14 came from Ecuador. However, this changed in 2024. "We started recording all shipments coming from Ecuador, which has caused drug traffickers to change their point of origin," say Customs Surveillance sources.

In 2024, six containers of cocaine from Colombia, five from Chile, three from Panama, one from Costa Rica, and only one from Ecuador were seized. However, this does not mean that the containers do not continue to be "contaminated" (this is the jargon used to refer to smuggling cocaine) in Ecuador, as port authorities know the point of origin, but not how many stops they have made along the maritime route. "Ecuador remains the hottest country," the same sources state. Drug traffickers—and now the Albanian mafia as well—control their ports, which primarily export food products that expire quickly, and therefore require faster searches. "Companies immediately pressure us," they admit.

Rip off

The dog, who persistently sniffs the sacks of cocoa from Ecuador, reaches the end of the container. Normally, the drugs aren't hidden inside the product itself, not even inside the sacks. They search the containers, put the merchandise in, and then add a fake one. hook method blind either rip off, present in the vast majority of interventions in the port of Barcelona: out of 42, up to 38 were blind hooks.

Criminal groups seek to hide drugs in fresh or expired merchandise. They also place them in bulky goods, such as coal, sugar, scrap metal, or industrial machinery. If they don't use the blind hook, drug traffickers create freight companies and hide the money inside the products themselves. Customs Surveillance agents still remember when, in 2010, at Mercabarna, they found 220 kilograms of cocaine inside some bananas.

Not long ago, the same Customs Surveillance agents who now inspect the cotton container registered 600 kilograms of cocaine coming from Ecuador. When they opened their doors, the sacks of cocaine were already clearly visible. This hasn't been made public. This isn't the case, but sometimes they let the drugs continue their journey to catch whoever is looking for them. These are called "controlled deliveries."

The Customs Surveillance inspection area is surrounded by security cameras. In every corner, on every column; there are no blind spots. During the inspections, they are assisted by a fixed scanner truck that allows for the analysis of large volumes, a van that also scans while moving, and another manual scanner. Above all, they look at the volumes of the shipments to detect changes in density. Cocaine doesn't have the same volume as sugar. Furthermore, the Tax Agency classifies containers by color according to risk. All containers coming from Ecuador, for example, pass through the red channel and therefore must be thoroughly inspected. Customs Surveillance assures that 10% of the containers that pass through are inspected, even if it's just by the scanner. The dog that sniffs cocoa won't find any cocaine. However, this container will still pass through the scanner.

On the other side of the port, behind the cotton container, it's time to check one coming from Turkey. The doors creak when they open, and suddenly, a stench of rotten grass permeates the air. It's filled with straw sacks. They look around and see nothing. It's coming from the scanner, which also hasn't detected anything unusual. Furthermore, when they empty it, the agents will notice that it's all straw. They say they have two agents from the US Drug Enforcement Administration, the notorious DEA, at customs headquarters, checking all containers going to their country. They check, above all, that there's nothing radioactive. They're not looking for drugs, but a possible radiological bomb targeting their country.

"There's very little that can be monitored."

The Port of Barcelona is a vast industrial park of 1,300 hectares by the sea. About the size of 2,000 football fields. A park enclosed by fences and with access restricted to a few people. There are cameras in every corner and strict access controls. "From a camera, they can see what you're typing on your phone," admits one worker. Previously, the police kept watch with binoculars from Montjuïc Mountain. Now, drones are deployed and everything is computerized. However, sources from the Prosecutor's Office admit that "the port is out of control."

"The problem with security breaches is the dockworkers. They know the places where there is the least surveillance. They know how long it takes to fix a broken camera," say sources from Customs Surveillance. Sources from the Prosecutor's Office criticize the lack of traceability of who does what. That is, who unloads a container, who opens it, who moves it around... Dockworkers are responsible for practically all the port jobs, from unloading containers to driving the new cars that arrive on large ships. One port frequenter says he would never get into a dockworker's car for fear of it being transporting drugs.

"There's very little oversight," dockworkers admit, referring to the large volume of goods arriving in Barcelona. "We get a good salary, but we don't drive a Lamborghini," the same source comments shortly afterward, pointing directly at David Caballero, known to everyone as Bubito, a long-time dockworker at the port with a high standard of living, was shot dead last year in Montgat. Police are investigating whether Lucky's gang, dismantled this January by the Civil Guard, was behind the crime. "Lucky controlled a large part of the cocaine entering the port," admits a source familiar with the infrastructure, adding that he bribed dockworkers and police officers.

In fact, the port is now undergoing a period of change, also in terms of its internal balance, especially following the dismantling of Lucky's gang, originally from the Sant Cosme del Prat de Llobregat neighborhood. "People are coming in." bad as stevedores," admit sources in the sector. Such as people linked to Lucky, which could be interpreted as a movement to maintain control of the infrastructure. All with the casual –the group linked to the Boixos Nois– is also trying to operate in the port, with the emergence of the Albanians. "They've already appeared," confirm Customs Surveillance sources, adding that they frequent Barceloneta in search of allies among the dockworkers. Becoming a stevedore isn't easy, but if you're well connected with one of these groups, as ARA has been able to confirm, you can work overnight. They'll open the door to you in exchange for helping them with their business.