PANews December 4 news, according to the Financial Times, a British-led operation has uncovered a multi-billion dollar money laundering scheme operating in London, Moscow and Dubai that enabled Russian spies and European drug traffickers to evade sanctions using cryptocurrencies. The UK National Crime Agency (NCA) said on Wednesday that its "destabilization operation" investigation focused on two companies, Smart and TGR, which acted as financial centers for well-funded global criminals and sanctioned individuals who were outside the banking system because of cryptocurrencies. The NCA said that from the end of 2022 to the summer of 2023, the network was used by clients including the Kinahan drug cartel, Irish cocaine traffickers involved in multiple contract killings, as well as ransomware groups and "Russian espionage." Rob Jones, NCA's director of operations, said the investigation was the "most important money laundering operation" the NCA had ever conducted. He said it "targeted money laundering centers that combined street cash and cryptocurrencies on a large scale."