The News Minute | December 3, 2014 | 9:00 am IST

British crime agency and border police Monday found about 300 kgs of cocaine on a cargo vessel in southern port city Portsmouth, authorities said Tuesday.

National Crime Agency said the drugs were seized when National Crime Agency, Border Force and the Irish Garda were searching the cargo vessel Star Stratos at Portsmouth port Monday evening, Xinhua reported.

The cocaine was found concealed within a shipment of bananas which had originated in Colombia.

National Crime Agency said the investigation is under way.

"Working with our law enforcement partners in the UK and Ireland we have successfully prevented a huge quantity of what is likely to be very high purity cocaine reaching our streets," said Tom Dowdall, deputy director of National Crime Agency's Border Policing Command.

It's the second joint operation between National Crime Agency and the Irish Garda in the past three months. The first seizure of huge amount of cocaine was in September, about a tonne of cocaine was seized by the Irish Naval Service from the yacht Makayabella around 480 km off the south west coast of Ireland, the agency said.

IANS