Two held in €11m heroin swoop

Two people were arrested today following the largest seizure of heroin in the history of the state.

A man and a woman, both in their 20s, were held for questioning in connection with a stash of drugs valued at over €11m discovered in an apartment in Dublin’s Clondalkin.

They were arrested shortly after 2pm in the Kilmainham area of Dublin. The man was held at Kilmainham Garda Station and the woman was taken to Kevin Street Garda Station for questioning.

They are being held under section two of the Criminal Justice (Drug Trafficking) Act, under which they can be held for up to seven days.

Uniformed officers carrying out the west Dublin raid on Tuesday night found a Heckler and Koch sub-machine gun, a silencer, thousands of rounds of ammunition and magazines for machine pistols.

Two men, one of them armed, ran off on foot after leaping from the first-floor apartment on Yellow Meadows Road, Clondalkin, when officers called with a search warrant around 8pm.

The apartment was raided by officers from Pearse Street Garda Station involved in Operation Anvil after a tip-off. They discovered 54 kilogrammes of heroin with a street value of more than €11m.

Around 25 kilogrammes of herbal cannabis believed to have a street value of €50,000 were also recovered.