Spanish police seized three metric tons of cocaine

Spanish police seized three metric tons (3.3 U.S. tons) of cocaine aboard a cargo ship in international waters near the Canary Islands and arrested 16 people, the Spanish Interior Ministry said Friday. Special forces and customs officers boarded the Panamanian-flagged ship before dawn Thursday in the culmination of an investigation that began in June 2004.

Police arrested the vessel's 10-man crew and six other men in the Canary Islands and Madrid, the AP says.

The cocaine was packed in 108 bundles and hidden among legitimate cargo in a hard-to-reach storeroom, the ministry said in a statement.

T.E.