Albanian drug gangs are bringing cocaine misery from Ecuador to the streets of Britain

Albanian gangsters have ruthlessly seized control of cocaine stocks in South America to flood Britain’s streets with record levels of the drug, a Daily Mail investigation revealed today.

The global tentacles of the bloodthirsty Balkan mafia kingpins now extend from the “narco-state” of Ecuador to cities and towns across Britain.

Details of the startling development are revealed in our new two-part investigation into the trail of destruction left in its wake by Britain’s insatiable demand for cocaine – fueling bloodshed abroad.

Our investigation and a companion documentary for The Mail+ and MailOnline, ALBANIAN NARCOS: Bullets, Bloodshed & Britain, expose the true cost of Britain’s cocaine epidemic both here and in Ecuador – a small, impoverished country 6,000 miles away.

The UK cocaine market is said to be worth a staggering £2 billion, with an estimated 976,000 users, while the annual number of cocaine-related deaths has increased seven-fold in a decade and now stands at 840.

In Brighton, in the shadow of the elegant Regency terraces that line the seafront, middle-class Britons can easily source the drug

Stephen Wright traveled to Guayaquil, Ecuador to investigate the drug gangs

Research by the National Crime Agency has shown that criminal groups organized by Albania control the cocaine market in the UK’s main cities and suburbs (with the exception of Merseyside, where local gangsters remain in charge).

Now these same drug lords have a firm grip on the distribution of cocaine from Ecuador, where they have been embroiled in a bloody battle with local cartels for dominance of the lucrative international cocaine trade.

In the first part of today’s research, we uncover how Albanian drug lords now control the supply of cocaine in the popular seaside resort of Brighton and Hove on Britain’s south coast, where one in five people is said to have used the substance, according to a survey.

According to sources, a mysterious underworld figure from Albania, known by only one initial, is one of the criminal masterminds of a network of drug dealers that supply cocaine to middle-class professionals, commuters and students.

Earlier this week it emerged that global cocaine production has hit record levels as demand surges again following Covid lockdowns.

According to a new report by the UN Office on Drugs and Crime, coca cultivation increased by 35 percent between 2020 and 2021, and the largest markets were in Europe and North America.

Top, left to right: drug dealer Ramazam Capa, Gjenti Capa, Ndricim Xhepa, Kadri Dema, Izmir Dema, Leonard Dema, Klinton Dani, Gledis Osmani and Mevlan Dema

The UK market for powder cocaine is worth a staggering £2 billion

Last month, a top Ecuadorian congressman revealed how the Albanian mafia threat has infected his country “using violence, bribery and front companies to set up an illegal multi-million dollar business of buying cocaine at a lower price in Latin America and marketing it in Europe’.

Fernando Villavicencio, president of the Congressional Oversight Committee, said around 4,000 Albanians live in Ecuador.

He added: “Drug trafficking, corruption and other forms of organized crime have contaminated a large part of the blood system of the Ecuadorian state, the political class and its parties, its judicial institutions and the financial system, even invading the law enforcement agencies responsible for fighting the organized crime.

“The intrusion, expansion and growth of organized crime has only been possible thanks to the collusion and complicity of political power. Today, the fragile institutional framework and its contemptible democracy are in serious jeopardy.’

Cocaine smuggled into the UK from Ecuador is usually hidden on container ships and imported via the ports of Rotterdam or Antwerp, where drug-related gangland crime has also risen sharply.

As revealed in our documentary about The Mail+ and MailOnline, parts of Ecuador were transformed into the “Wild West” when Albanian drug lords and South American cartels fought each other.

“Brighton is a party town,” says one resident. “People from all walks of life use cocaine.”

With exclusive, on-the-file briefings from police chiefs, Home Office officials, customs chiefs and senior military figures, plus unprecedented access to confidential intelligence reports, our investigation delivers the chilling inside story of how cocaine is smuggled from the UK into South America.

For nearly a month, Mail journalists in Ecuador were invited to anti-drug operations and witnessed the arrest of two fishermen attempting to smuggle $20 million (£16.4 million) worth of cocaine off the coast of Ecuador.

In the second part of our investigation, an Ecuadorian gangster breaks the mafia’s code of silence to reveal how his mob is working with Albanian narcos to smuggle tons of cocaine into the UK and Europe. In an extraordinary encounter, he reveals how he carried out his first assassination attempt at the age of 14.

We also unveil the untold story of one of Albania’s most notorious drug dealers, who was controversially paroled from a prison in Ecuador.

Dritan Rexhepi is called the “King of the Escape” for escaping prisons in Belgium and Albania; and the “King of Cocaine” for his “success” in bringing cocaine to Europe.

He now appears ready to exploit a loophole in the law to avoid extradition to Europe, where he is wanted for a range of gang crimes including murder.

Rexhepi, who was on a Scotland Yard Most Wanted list, is typical of many Albanian narcos based in Ecuador who, by cutting out traditional middlemen, deal directly with cocaine producers in South America and command the entire supply chain of the drug from South America to Europe – especially to Great Britain.

Senior UK law enforcement believe traffickers bringing Albanian migrants across the Channel are working with local drug lords to provide foot soldiers delivering cocaine on Britain’s streets.

Source: | This article originally belongs to Dailymail.co.uk