2 more caught for Cork coke

Another two Greeks have been arrested in Piraeus on suspicion of having masterminded a ring that smuggled cocaine to Europe on a World War II German torpedo boat, police in Athens said yesterday. The Greek captain and seven crew members – six of whom are Greek – of the Cork were arrested during a raid in the Atlantic last Thursday by Spanish and British authorities who seized 3.6 tons of cocaine on the vessel. Yesterday, Greek police said the operation followed four years of investigation by the Greek financial crimes squad’s drugs department, the Greek coast guard and the US Drug Enforcement Administration. The two men arrested in Piraeus are mechanical engineer Giorgos Panagopoulos, 43, and ship engineer Giorgos Paralis, 51. Panagopoulos is the representative in Greece of a Greek-owned, Liberian-registered ship brokerage firm. Paralis is believed to have arranged for the 42-meter decommissioned torpedo boat to be refurbished in a Greek shipyard, and to have traveled extensively on the Cork.