British girls held in Ghana 'with €440,000 in drugs'

Two 16-year-old girls from Britain allegedly carrying cocaine worth £300,000 (€442,000) have been held by police in Ghana.

The teenagers from London were arrested at Accra airport, UK Revenue and Customs said.

A spokeswoman said they were allegedly carrying an estimated £300,000 (€442,000)-worth of cocaine.

The drugs were said to have been found on them by officers from the Ghanaian Narcotic Control Board (NACOB).

The officers are taking part in Operation Westbridge, a project set up by UK Revenue and Customs (HMRC) in conjunction with the Ghanaian authorities to tackle the problems of drug smugglers using the airport as a gateway to the UK and Europe.

Tony Walker, leading the operation for HMRC, said the alleged use of such young girls as couriers “vividly illustrates the ruthlessness of the criminal drug gangs involved in this traffic”.

He added: “The dedication of UK and Ghanaian drug detection officers has prevented deadly Class A drugs from entering the UK.

“The Westbridge collaboration between Ghana and the UK is delivering real results in this and other cases by helping to protect both countries from the violence and corruption that always accompanies the trade in illegal drugs.”

In the operation, which was launched last November, HMRC officers give technical and operational expertise to the Ghanaian government.

This includes training in the use of Foreign Office-funded scanning equipment.

The project follows the success of Operation Airbridge, a joint UK/Jamaican initiative to catch drug couriers with internal concealments of Class A drugs before they board planes from Jamaica.

HMRC believes that operation has proved the value of working in partnership with local law enforcement agencies – during the four years that operation has been running, the number of “drug swallowers” detected at UK airports from Jamaica has fallen markedly.

West Africa has been identified as a staging post for Class A drugs targeted on the UK.