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An international fugitive was arrested in Dubai this week following a years-long manhunt.
Daniel Kinahan, the alleged leader of one of Ireland’s biggest criminal gangs, the Kinahan cartel, was arrested on organized crime charges on Wednesday in a covert operation involving Irish and United Arab Emirates authorities.
The 48-year-old alleged crime boss is expected to face charges in Ireland related to a gangland feud between the Kinahan cartel and the Hutch gang that has left 18 people dead since 2015.
Dubai police didn’t name Kinahan, saying they had “arrested an Irish fugitive for his alleged role in an organised criminal group involved in international crimes in his home country.”
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Split of Daniel Kinahan and Dubai (U.S. Treasury Department; Fadel SENNA / AFP via Getty Images)
He was identified by Irish media outlets on Friday.
Ireland’s national police force, the Garda Síochána said an Irish man in his 40s was arrested under a warrant from the Irish courts.
“An Garda Síochána has been steadfast in our determination that we would pursue those allegedly involved in serious Organized Criminal activity, wherever they go,” the police said in a statement, according to The Irish Star. “Today’s arrest is another extremely important demonstration of the need for international law enforcement co-operation in tackling transnational organized crime.”
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Members of An Garda Síochána in Dublin in February. (Natalia Campos/Getty Images)
Kinahan fled Ireland for Spain, then the UAE after he was the believed target in an assassination attempt that left an associate of the Kinahan cartel, David Byrne, dead at a boxing weigh-in at the Regency Hotel in Dublin.
The U.S. Treasury Department offered a reward of $5 million in 2022 for information leading to the arrest of the Kinahan cartel’s leaders or the organization’s “financial destruction.”
Spanish police officers in 2022 raided 11 locations in Spain and England, arresting four people linked to the largest known money laundering organization in Spain, suspected of laundering more than €200 million in 18 months. The main target is considered a high-value individual by Europol and connected to the Irish Kinahan cartel. (Spanish Civil Guard/Anadolu Agency)
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The cartel is considered a juggernaut in the European drug trade, and, along with other European crime organizations, has created a “super cartel” that controls around a third of Europe’s cocaine trade.
Kinahan is also affiliated with the boxing world, and was the founder of boxing management company MTK Global.
Reuters and The Associated Press contributed to this report.