Navy seizes three tons of drugs in Gulf

THREE tons of hashish with a street value of millions of pounds has been seized in the Gulf by a Royal Navy warship.

HMS Dragon, a Type 45 destroyer, was on patrol in the Middle East when it made one of the most significant drug busts in the region this year.

The Ministry of Defence described the find as ‘dealing a major blow to the funding of terrorism’.

Sailors and Royal Marines came across a suspicious dhow – a type of sailing vessel – in a notorious drug smuggling route known as the Hash Highway last week.

They launched fast boats to intercept and board the vessel, before searching its compartments. They found 148 bags of hashish, a form of cannabis.

The Hash Highway runs from Afghanistan, a major drugs producer, by land through Iran or Pakistan, and then across the sea to countries in east Africa and the Middle East.

Profits from drug smuggling are a known source of funding for terrorist organisations and crime networks.