Italian and U.S. agents broke up a major cocaine trafficking network between Central America, the United States and Europe Thursday, detaining 13 Italians suspected of links to organised crime, police said. Italy's elite SCO police and FBI agents captured the men as they slept in their homes in the southern Calabria region and detained them on suspicion of being part of an international drug trafficking ring.

The year-long investigation, dubbed Operation Columbus, was led by federal investigators in Brooklyn and prosecutors in Calabria, the region that is home to the 'Ndrangheta, a mainland version of the Sicilian Mafia. American agents seized 55 kilos (121 pounds) of cocaine hidden in two shipments of fresh cassava from Central America to Philadelphia and Wilmington, Delaware, officials said.

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Source: http://www.dailystar.com.lb/