There are early reports from gardaí of a drop in 999 calls and a general reduction in policing demands as Covid-19 sees a mass closure of pubs, fewer cars on the road and people staying indoors.

Garda anti-gang units have delivered a blow to one of the country’s biggest drug traffickers

The sharp rise in spying by the Defence Forces is due to “enhanced intelligence” from a number of sources, an oversight report said.

Officers from the Garda Drugs and Organised Crime Bureau, supported by the Special Crime Task Force, swooped on two vehicles on the Naas Road in south Dublin on Tuesday.

Young people are seen as “plentiful and expendable” by gang bosses.

The Kinahan drug cartel is a main driver in the surge of cocaine coming into Europe and Ireland’s middle- and high-income earners are “fuelling” the trade here, garda sources have said.

A court has heard a would-be assassin complaining about how taking cocaine was negating the effect of his Viagra and making him “paranoid”, in a recording secretly captured by gardai.

Garda bosses say the “unprecedented” number of gangland convictions in the courts in the last fortnight highlights the “unrelenting” approach of State agencies to tackling organised crime.

Anyone who thinks that drug gangs are confined to Dublin and other major cities in Ireland need to think again. It is a nationwide scourge that forms a deadly triangle between Dublin and Drogheda on the east coast and Sligo in the West.

Gardaí fear that there could be more violence after a third murder in seven days in north Dublin.

Gardaí are investigating two gangland murders, both involving young men, in north Dublin in less than a day.

Solicitor Gerald Kean has told a High Court jury he was “shell-shocked” by a front-page newspaper article concerning a visit by members of the Criminal Assets Bureau to his Dublin office three years ago.

Europol, the EU police agency, wants experts from the Criminal Assets Bureau to help set up a specialist unit to target the finances of crime bosses across Europe.

Garda figures appear to indicate a sharp rise in the quantity of cocaine being trafficked into the country, replicating trends across Europe.

Gangland murder victim Eric Fowler was under pressure to pay a drug debt and had separately ordered a local criminal to pay a debt owed to him.

The Criminal Assets Bureau has seized five high-end cars as part of an ongoing operation targeting one of the country's biggest drug trafficking gangs.

Over the weekend gardaí seized just over €1.7m in cash.

Sinn Féin has welcomed the conviction of gangland murderer Freddie Thompson at the Special Criminal Court.

The Irish navy and air corps played a key role in the seizure of at least 500kg of cocaine in an international operation targeting a major drug-trafficking gang.

Prison and Garda authorities are investigating a security incident at the weekend when a replica firearm was discovered in the grounds of a Dublin jail.

Garda operations against feuding gangs and roaming burglary groups are believed to be driving a surge in the number of people being held on remand in prison.

Forensic tests are being conducted on the bicycle of a youth who took a suspected handgun from the body of a dying man as he was being treated by paramedics.

A busted “backyard” drug factory linked to the Kinahan crime cartel was capable of producing up to 7,000 ecstasy pills every hour, gardaí believe.

An operation was carried out on Sunday by officers from the Garda National Drugs and Organised Crime Bureau supported by the Special Crime Task Force.

Gardaí are to use evidence seized from the darknet in forthcoming high-profile prosecutions against organised crime groups.

There is an “unprecedented” number of people before the courts or in custody on suspicion of conspiracy to murder, Garda bosses investigating the Kinahan crime cartel have said.

A presumed homeless man staying in a hotel at the expense of the State was found with €12,000 in cash and a further €140,000 in a bank account when he was targeted in a planned operation by the Criminal Assets Bureau.

Garda districts at the coalface of tackling gangs affiliated to the Kinahan cartel have seen a drop of almost 30% in staffing.

The numbers of community gardaí have been axed by almost 40% in the last seven years and continue to fall in many divisions.

This is a family, not a cartel.

As undertakers mounted the floral displays on to the top of the horse-drawn carriage, the rain turned to sleet.

Detectives are investigating if the latest gangland murder is linked to the Kinahan crime cartel.

Key players in the Kinahan crime cartel will be brought before the courts in the near future, Dublin’s top garda has said.

The Criminal Assets Bureau has conducted searches targeting the purchase of properties by an associate of the Kinahan crime cartel.

High-visibility armed patrols in Dublin have been reduced by up to 30% because of overtime cuts, separate garda sources have said.

2017 was dominated by knives, rural crime, burglaries and gangland feuds, reports Security Correspondent Cormac O’Keeffe.

Three cars worth €100k, 20 watches worth €200k, and €28,500 cash seized from drug dealing brothers.

Irish criminals in the Netherlands will be “tracked down” and “handed over to the Irish authorities”, Dutch police say.

Irish criminals in the Netherlands will be “tracked down” and “handed over to the Irish authorities”, Dutch police say.

Gardaí say the Kinahan crime cartel is “running out of people to do their work” after an international operation resulted in 13 arrests in Ireland and the Netherlands and the seizure of an estimated €10m worth of drugs.

Detectives are investigating if the shooting dead of a gangland criminal at the weekend is linked to a local feud or was a revenge attack for a botched double murder last August.

Gardaí are continuing to detain a man and a woman in Dublin, following an operation targeting gangland crime.