ATLANTIC OCEAN — Europol coordinated a multinational operation in the Atlantic Ocean from April 13 to April 26 that intercepted eight vessels, seized more than 12 tons of cocaine and about 9.5 metric tons of hashish, and resulted in 54 arrests. The weekslong mission targeted drug trafficking routes running from Latin America to Europe.

Law enforcement agents were deployed to sites across the Atlantic, focusing on the stretch of ocean between Spain's Canary Islands and Portugal's Azores. Authorities refer to that section as the "cocaine highway" because of frequent trafficking activity there. The mission, which involved international law enforcement bureaus, tasked agents with detecting, tracking, and intercepting vessels suspected of drug trafficking.

Europol aimed to target networks moving cocaine from Latin America to Europe through at-sea transfers designed to evade detection by avoiding major ports. The agency had warned earlier this year that trafficking networks were changing how they moved cocaine across the Atlantic, and it said the latest results reinforced its prior beliefs about those changes.

Europol said the operation confirmed that criminal networks are increasingly moving cocaine offshore to reduce exposure to law enforcement at major ports, and that shipments across the Atlantic are now moved in multiple stages. Authorities refer to such piecemeal drug transfers as "fragmented maritime routes." Intelligence gathered during the operation helped authorities gain a better understanding of how evolving trafficking networks work.

Jean-Philippe Lecouffe, Europol's deputy executive director of operations, said the operation demonstrated the reach of the effort. "Over a two-week operational period, law enforcement dealt a significant blow to what is known as the cocaine highway," he said. "Criminal networks are becoming increasingly flexible, and internationally connected. But our response is evolving fast too."