UK's 'coke king' busted on the Costa Blanca, Spain

Benidorm - Britain's criminals might just start thinking twice about moving to Spain to continue plying their "trade," as Spanish police have arrested a notorious UK drug dealer and "coke king," Brian Charrington, and several accomplices.

On Monday, Spanish National Police arrested Charrington, who is suspected of running an international trafficking racket involving cocaine from Venezuela.

Overall, police arrested 13 people in both Spain and Venezuela, including Charrington, who police describe as "one of the 10 criminals most investigated by European police and leader of an international drug-trafficking organization."

According to a statement, officers seized 220 kilos (485 pounds) of cocaine from an apartment in L'Albir, close to Benidorm on the Costa Blanca, and also impounded property and bank accounts worth more than €5 million ($6.5 million).

The organization used a group of drug mules to fly cocaine into Spain using commercial flights, and officers intercepted at Barajas Airport, Madrid a man carrying five kilos of cocaine in eight packages distributed across specially adapted underwear, pictured above.
 The Daily Mirror reports that the arrests have also smashed a further plot to smuggle tons of cocaine into Europe via "an armada of yachts."

57-year-old Charrington, who has his own Wikipedia page, used to operate in the North East of England during the 1980's. He rose to fame as a major drug baron in 1992, when a raid at his Middlesbrough home unearthed almost €2.3 million in cash, which was all allegedly linked to drug dealing. While arrested in 1992, he was never formally charged, due to faulty police procedures.

It seems he moved to the sunny Costa Blanca to avoid any further UK problems only to finally meet up with the Spanish National Police.

This news comes shortly after the arrest of yet another notorious UK criminal, Mark Alan Lilley, a convicted drug trafficker who had been on the run for 13 years. As Digital Journal reported, the man was caught by Spanish police in his villa in southern Spain, hiding away in his safe room.

To the source: http://www.digitaljournal.com/article/354498

Spanish tourists start a return to the Costa del Sol

After a bit of a break, most probably due to the economic crisis, local tourists are now back on the Costa del Sol.

 Beach at Torremolinos 

Torremolinos is now the second most popular destination in the country, second only to Benidorm, in terms of hotel occupancy.

Good news indeed for local tourism in southern Spain, as tourism figures for May confirm an increase in the popularity of the Costa del Sol for Spaniards, after a two-year decrease in occupancy.

Sur in English says that INE (National Institute of Statistics) is reporting that domestic tourism figures are up by 20.6% in May compared with 2012, and the number of hotel nights are up by 19%.  This all adds up to an additional 25,383 Spanish visitors, staying 57,000 more nights than they did in May last year.

The positive upward trend coincides with the campaigns launched by the Junta de Andalucía and central government to encourage Spaniards to "holiday at home."  With a country as versatile as Spain, the possibilities are, of course, endless.

Reportedly, the numbers of foreign tourists visiting the Costa del Sol also increased in May by 13%, which meant a 12% increase in overnight hotel stays.

INE reckons that 301,934 foreign tourists visited the Costa in May, reserving 1,258,199 nights in hotels.

So far, Torremolinos has benefited most from the increases and is now second only to Benidorm for hotel occupancy.

May saw 79.7% of Torremolinos hotels booked, an increase of 13% on overnight stays compared with the same time the previous year, bringing a total of around 495,000. 

Generally in Andalucía there was an increase in hotel stays of 11.4 per cent in May.

Good news indeed for a country who relies so much on tourism, especially during these difficult times.