Spanish National Police have broken up a criminal gang which was based in the Valencia region

Spanish National Police have broken up a criminal gang which was based in the Valencia region and made up of citizens from Eastern Europe, mostly from the Ukraine and Russia.The gang was engaged in criminal activities such as vehicle theft, arms trafficking and extortion, and they also had a laboratory set up for identity document and money falsification. In total there have been 11 arrests in a police operation in which some 70 officers...

Hundreds of Britons who have sold a property in Spain between June 2004 and December 2006 have begun the fight to reclaim their money

Hundreds of Britons who have sold a property in Spain between June 2004 and December 2006 have begun the fight to reclaim their money from the Spanish government, who overcharged them Capital Gains Tax by 20%. However, where as initial conservative estimates put the total amount to be reclaimed at £11,000 per person – totalling an estimated £37 million – over the last three months hundreds of Brits have registered average reclaims of more...

Work to rule threatens airports and border

Protests over wages by National Police officers could bring airports and border crossings to a standstill in July with officers threatening to scrupulously follow the rules - checking almost everyone entering or leaving the country, filing charges for all offences and filling in all the relevant paperwork.The protests are due to take place on Wednesdays and Thursdays throughout July in a bid to force the interior ministry to equate officers’...

Half a million British expatriates living on Spain’s Costa Blanca are to lose their right to free healthcare

Half a million British expatriates living on Spain’s Costa Blanca are to lose their right to free healthcare under a radical new law introduced by the provincial government.The Spanish authorities say that providing for 500,000 Britons - most of whom are over 50 - and other European residents living in the Valencia region is placing an impossible burden on the country’s health service.Valencia region can no longer afford expats’ bills as...

55-year-old, identified in German media as Mikhail R., was picked up at his Berlin apartment on Thursday on the basis of a European arrest warrant

A suspected Russian mafia lynchpin has been arrested in Berlin, following a swoop on Russian money launderers and arms traffickers in Spain, prosecutors said Saturday.The 55-year-old, identified in German media as Mikhail R., was picked up at his Berlin apartment on Thursday on the basis of a European arrest warrant requested by Spanish authorities.A court will decide whether to extradite the man, who is wanted on charges of money laundering,...

Mark Thatcher faces eviction from his Costa del Sol hideaway

Mark Thatcher faces eviction from his Costa del Sol hideaway after his landlord branded him the tenant from hell.The disgraced son of former Tory Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher is being taken to court to get him out of the £1.5million villa he has rented for two years.Exasperated landlord Stephen Humberstone claimed that Thatcher, 54, has broken antiques, messed up the garden and is months in arrears with his rent. The fellow Old Harrovian...

British mother has been arrested in Spain after she allegedly left her five-year-old son to burn on a baking hot beach for 12 hours

British mother has been arrested in Spain after she allegedly left her five-year-old son to burn on a baking hot beach for 12 hours while she went to work.The boy's mother, aged 19, reportedly left him playing in the sand at the popular resort of Benalmadena, in the Costa del Sol, where he suffered serious sunburn and had to be later admitted to hospital.According to locals, at around 10am the woman went to work at the top of the beach...

20 year old Romanian man has been arrested by police

20 year old Romanian man has been arrested by police in Madrid in connection with the death of a German pensioner couple who were stabbed to death last Monday night in their attic flat home in Teulada.The arrested man had been working as the gardener in the complex where the Germans, aged 78 and 85, had previously lived in Benissa, and police think that he knew that the couple had a large amount of money in cash as they were about to purchase...

Amy Fitzpatrick psychic investigator Joe Power told Spanish police they should search a fenced-off area in the Costa del Sol

An Englishman who describes himself as a psychic investigator has claimed that clues to finding missing Amy Fitzpatrick are to be found in an area of land in Spain.Joe Power told Spanish police they should search a fenced-off area in the Costa del Sol for clues after he travelled to Spain in cooperation with one of the missing teenager's aunts.Dubliner Amy Fitzpatrick...

Gennadios Petrov, the alleged head of the Tambovskaya-Malyshevkaya gang in Spain

Gennadios Petrov, the alleged head of the Russian mafia in Spain.Petrov is said to head the Tambovskaya-Malyshevkaya gang from the sunny climes of Calvi, one of the most exclusive villages in Majorca. He counted among his neighbours Pilar de Borbón, the sister of King Juan Carlos of Spain.Accustomed to handing out tips of €500 (£393) and not looking at the price tag when buying designer jackets, Petrov lived surrounded by tight security....

25 people were arrested Tuesday in a new swoop against real estate corruption in Estepona, including the Socialist Mayor, Antonio Barrientos

25 people were arrested Tuesday in a new swoop against real estate corruption in Estepona, including the Socialist Mayor, Antonio Barrientos and several councillors. Also in custody are the municipal architect Arturo Cebrián, the Councillor for Hacienda , Francisco Zamorano.Police sources indicate that the operation comes following an investigation into allegedly...

Monzer al-Kassar lived an openly lavish lifestyle as the so-called "Prince of Marbella" like a villain out of a James Bond movie.

Monzer al-Kassar has played a key role in some of the worst atrocities committed against Israeli and Jewish civilians, and his links to one Arab regime in particular - that of his native country, Syria - deserve special scrutiny at a moment when Jerusalem is just about to begin potentially historic negotiations with its government. Kassar, 63, is an international arms dealer, and, by some accounts, has spent much of his lifetime as a key...

25,000 armed police were used to get traffic moving and restore calm after clashes between protesters and lorry drivers who refused to strike.

25,000 armed police were used to get traffic moving and restore calm after clashes between protesters and lorry drivers who refused to strike.Authorities promised to provide police escorts to drivers wanting to work in an effort to restore the flow of supplies across the country, after fuel pumps ran dry and supermarket shelves emptied.On Wednesday, a driver working for a non-striking company suffered burns to 25 per cent of his body when...

Holidaymakers have been warned that fresh food supplies are running low in Spanish shops Supermarket shelves in Marbella were almost empty yesterday

Holidaymakers have been warned that fresh food supplies are running low in Spanish shops and restaurants after the third day of a truckers' strike.Supermarkets, bars and eateries have been unable to restock essentials such as meat, fish, fruit and vegetables. Some restaurants in the Costa del Sol were yesterday offering reduced menus and many feared they will be forced to shut within days.The striking drivers have blocked off wholesale...

Costa del Sol, where hundreds of foreigners, especially Britons, have unwittingly purchased illegally-built homes.

article over the weekend in the Spanish daily EL Pais, entitled ‘La Axarquia, a building and whitewash catastrophe’, shed light on the urban planning and illegal building problems in the La Axarquia region of the Costa del Sol, where hundreds of foreigners, especially Britons, have unwittingly purchased illegally-built homes.La Axarquia is a county of 29 coastal and interior municipalities in eastern part of Malaga province, and is also...

Mark Thatcher in hiding at Casa Flores rumours abound of kidnap squads Russian gangs has been mentioned being recruited to snatch Sir Mark

It would be hard to find a better bolt hole than the Casa Flores, a luxury villa hidden in dense forest on a mountain above San Pedro de Alcantara, southern Spain. Casa Flores is part of a complex called El Madronal. Unlike the high-density “urbanisations” that now disfigure the entire Mediterranean coast of Spain, El Madronal offers luxury, privacy and, above...

400 Ravers turn Costa del Sol home in Marbella’s exclusive El Pariaso development into a wreck.

trashed a £5million house after a girl advertised her 16th birthday party on the internet.Drunken revellers hurled a television and tables and chairs into the swimming pool, smashed doors, destroyed carpets, damaged walls and stole £6,000 of jewellery and designer clothes.Someone had spread a rumour that the owners did not mind if the seven-bedroom mansion was...