Cannabis and cocaine worth €1.5m seized in Kildare and Meath

More than €1.5 million worth of cannabis and cocaine as well as almost €40,000 in cash were seized by gardaí over the weekend in multiple raids across Kildare and Meath.

At around 11.30am on Saturday gardaí pulled over a vehicle on the M1 Motorway in Meath and carried out a search operation, during the course of which €39,750 in cash was uncovered and seized.

The driver, a man in his 20s, was arrested at the scene and taken to Ashbourne Garda station where he is being detained under Section 2 of the Criminal Justice (Drug Trafficking) Act, 1996.

The discovery of the money and the arrest immediately prompted several other searches with properties in the Newbridge area of Co Kildare targeted from midday on Saturday.

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In these follow-up raids, around €420,000 of suspected cocaine and €1.12 million of suspected cannabis were seized with suspected mixing agents and other drug paraphernalia also seized.

The drugs seized will now be sent to Forensic Science Ireland for analysis and the investigation is ongoing.

This seizure was part of Operation Tara, an enhanced national anti-drugs strategy launched by Garda Commissioner Drew Harris last July.

The focus of Operation Tara is to disrupt, dismantle and prosecute drug trafficking networks, at all levels - international, national, local - involved in the importation, distribution, cultivation, production, local sale and supply of controlled drugs.