Global crime ring bust intercepts drugs for Melbourne
International investigators have dismantled a global criminal network involved in money laundering and drug trafficking and seized a drug shipment bound for Melbourne, Europol officials in The Hague said.
15 suspects were arrested in Australia, Sweden, Spain and Germany in the Swedish-led operation against companies used as fronts by criminal gangs to launder the proceeds of drug trafficking.
The network stretched from Europe to Asia and Australia, according to Europol.
“This case shows what organized crime looks like today,” said Andy Kaag, head of Europol’s European organized crime centre.
“It all started with something small – two cell phones seized from a smuggler in a small Swedish town. But what investigators found inside wasn’t a local story. It was a global criminal enterprise.”
Swedish deputy police chief Mats Berggren said that the process, which turned into a major international cooperation called Operation Candy, started with the seizure of phones in 2024.
He did not name the town, citing the ongoing investigation.
But local police found data stored on the phones related to a complex global criminal network, Berggren added.
Investigators in the four countries worked together for two years, culminating in Europol-coordinated raids and arrests this week.
Dozens of buildings were searched and computers and phones were seized, among other items.
The operation was also supported by European judicial authority Eurojust and authorities in Thailand, where members of the network trafficked drugs online, primarily to Scandinavian countries.
Investigators said the drugs were then distributed in Sweden and the profits were laundered through a complex system of transfers through legitimate companies.
Police in Germany seized 1.2 metric tons of synthetic drugs destined for Australia.
The drugs were destined for Melbourne in a shipment that arrived in April 2025, AFP Commander Chris Woods told a news conference on Friday.
Two people were later arrested in Melbourne and other suspected VIPs were detained in Sweden and Spain.
Commander Woods said authorities had “prevented an alleged criminal organization from brutally exposing Victorian and Australian communities to immeasurable drug harm”.
“Australia’s insatiable appetite for illicit drugs fuels the greed of organized crime globally,” he said.
According to Europol, many of these had not previously been on the police radar.
