More than 1,000 suspected criminals have been arrested in what Europol calls the biggest ever cross-border anti-organised crime operation in Europe. Operation Archimedes was carried out in stages over the past week.

Police officers from 28 EU nations worked together with six partner countries on the operation. The idea was to tackle organised criminal activities such arms trading, human trafficking and drug smuggling.

Europol Director Rob Wainwright told euronews about the operation: “What we have done in this operation is brought together the combined forces of law enforcement community. Working together over nine days, carrying out over 250 operational actions in 300 towns, cities, airports, ports, right around Europe to dismantle the criminal infrastructure that is preying on our citizens and our economy every day. I think in terms of the scale and impact of this operation, it ranks as the single largest coordinated assault on organised crime that we’ve seen in Europe.”

Arrests were made at locations including airports and border crossings by officers from all member states as well as from Australia, Colombia, Norway, Serbia, Switzerland and the United States.

During the raids around 600 kilos of cocaine and 200 kilos of heroine were seized.