You're reading: RFE/RL: Argentina-Russia cocaine plot suspect extradited from Germany, jailed in Moscow

RFE/RL: Argentina-Russia cocaine plot suspect extradited from Germany, jailed in Moscow

Published July 30, 2018 at 5:24 pm

Undated handout picture released on February 22, 2018 by Argentina's Security Ministry taken in Buenos Aires during a police sting operation which resulted in the seizure of nearly 400 kilos of cocaine from the Russian embassy in Buenos Aires and arrested several members of a drug trafficking gang.Argentina's Security Minister Patricia Bullrich announced in a press conference on February 22, 2018 that the drugs were discovered in an annex of the embassy. "A gang of narco-criminals was trying to use the diplomatic courier service of the Russian embassy" to ship the drugs to Europe, she said, adding that Russian and Argentine police had decided to mount a sting operation after the Russian ambassador informed them of the drugs find in December 2016. / AFP PHOTO / Argentina's Security Ministry / HO / RESTRICTED TO EDITORIAL USE - MANDATORY CREDIT "AFP PHOTO / ARGENTINA'S SECURITY MINISTRY /HO" - NO MARKETING NO ADVERTISING CAMPAIGNS - DISTRIBUTED AS A SERVICE TO CLIENTS

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A man the Federal Security Service (FSB) claims was behind an alleged attempt to smuggle nearly 400 kilograms of cocaine from Argentina to Russia has been extradited from Germany and is in a Moscow jail, his lawyer says.

Suspect Andrei Kovalchuk “is in Matrosskaya Tishina detention center and has been formally charged with illegal drug trafficking,” the lawyer, Vladimir Zherebenkov, said on July 30.