{"id":627633,"date":"2025-12-12T04:34:37","date_gmt":"2025-12-12T04:34:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/627633\/"},"modified":"2025-12-12T04:34:37","modified_gmt":"2025-12-12T04:34:37","slug":"more-than-3m-seized-from-cross-border-money-laundering-nexus-says-nca-chief-the-irish-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/627633\/","title":{"rendered":"More than \u00a33m seized from cross-border \u2018money-laundering nexus\u2019, says NCA chief \u2013 The Irish News"},"content":{"rendered":"

More than \u00a33 million in cash has been seized following the disruption of a cross-border \u201cmoney-laundering nexus\u201d, the chief executive of the National Crime Agency (NCA) has said.<\/p>\n

Graeme Biggar told the Policing Board in Belfast that his organisation was working alongside the PSNI to disrupt the activities of \u201cquite sophisticated organised crime groups\u201d operating in Northern Ireland.<\/p>\n

Mr Biggar said three arrests had been made in July following an investigation into a drug-smuggling organisation.<\/p>\n

Read more: <\/p>\n

\"Homeless<\/a>\"Deadly<\/a><\/p>\n

He said: \u201cThat is a Northern Ireland-based, drug-smuggling, organised crime group that is importing drugs from Europe into the UK, including into Northern Ireland.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey are big, they are sophisticated, we have been investigating them for some time.\u201d<\/p>\n

Turning to a separate investigation, he said: \u201cWe have found a money-laundering nexus in Newry.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe location, unsurprising, it is money laundering that is going across the border, up from Dublin and into Northern Ireland.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn that investigation, which has been going on for some time, it is really quite sophisticated.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have, so far, made nine arrests.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mr Biggar added: \u201cWe are now over \u00a33 million in cash that has been seized from that investigation.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think there is a lot more to come from that, in cash to be seized and also spin-off investigations that will come from it, and also further arrests that will be made.\u201d<\/p>\n

The NCA director general said his organisation was also involved in \u201casset denial work\u201d targeting paramilitaries in the region.<\/p>\n

He said: \u201cWe have \u00a31.5 million of assets that we have either frozen or we are investigating in Northern Ireland, largely associated with former paramilitaries and serious and organised crime.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd a further, more than \u00a33 million associated with the same investigations, assets that are connected to Northern Ireland but held outside in GB.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"GraemeGraeme Biggar said the NCA is committed to the work it does in NI (Liam McBurney\/PA) <\/p>\n

He said, last week, the NCA obtained a property freezing order on a property in Northern Ireland worth \u00a3300,000 for an \u201cindividual who is currently in prison for drugs and money-laundering offences\u201d.<\/p>\n

He added: \u201cThe asset denial work that we do, we set a much lower bar and threshold for taking on cases in Northern Ireland than we would elsewhere.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are massively committed to what we do here.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mr Biggar said there was an increasing amount of drugs coming into the UK from the Republic of Ireland, both from HGV vehicles travelling on ferries and drop-offs.<\/p>\n

He said: \u201cWe are seeing more drugs coming in through the Common Travel Area into GB.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"More than \u00a33 million in cash has been seized following the disruption of a cross-border \u201cmoney-laundering nexus\u201d, the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":627634,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5011],"tags":[194546,91141,68211,2003,11583,68212,5820,1144,18681,1610,13136,16,7913,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-627633","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-northern-ireland","8":"tag-asset-denial","9":"tag-drug-smuggling","10":"tag-graeme-biggar","11":"tag-law-enforcement","12":"tag-money-laundering","13":"tag-national-crime-agency","14":"tag-newry","15":"tag-northern-ireland","16":"tag-organised-crime","17":"tag-police-service-of-northern-ireland","18":"tag-republic-of-ireland","19":"tag-uk","20":"tag-ulster","21":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115704738745082970","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/627633","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=627633"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/627633\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/627634"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=627633"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=627633"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=627633"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}