€2.7m cannabis haul was for North, gardaí believe

CANNABIS with a street value of 2.7m has been seized by gardaí after a lorry was stopped and searched in north Co Dublin yesterday.

More than 200kg of the resin was packed into the container lorry which was stopped by members of the National Drugs Unit and local gardaí following a surveillance operation.

A man in his 40s was arrested after the lunchtime seizure in the village of Garristown. It is the second large cannabis find in the area in recent weeks. 2.5m worth was discovered near Ashbourne last month.

The arrested man was taken to Ashbourne garda station and is being held under the Drug Trafficking Act.

The cannabis is believed to have been destined for sale in the North, where laws on possession of the drug are to be relaxed. British Home Secretary David Blunkett has announced his intention to downgrade cannabis from a class B to class C drug.

Anyone caught in possession of small quantities of the drug will only receive a caution under the new laws.

The British government’s former drug’s tsar, Keith Hellawell, has criticised the move.

Mr Blunkett is set to reclassify the drug in an attempt to free police resources to combat dealers peddling harder narcotics.