The Prime Minister of the British Virgin Islands, Andrew Foy, has been arrested in Florida.
Andrew Foy, 51, faces charges of drug trafficking and money laundering, the government of the U.K.'s offshore territory announced.
"It is my duty as governor to inform you that this morning Prime Minister Andrew Foy was arrested in Miami on charges related to drug importation (into the US) and money laundering," John Rankin, the governor of the Virgin Islands, said in a press release. He called the development "shocking."
The director of the Virgin Islands Port Authority, Oleanveen Maynard, and her son Kadim Maynard were also arrested for the same reasons, Anne Milgram, head of the US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), said in a statement, a copy of which was consulted by Agence France-Presse.
"Anyone involved in importing drugs into the US will be held accountable, whatever their position," Ms Milgram said.
The three defendants were arrested at an airport in North Miami, where they had made appointments with Mexican drug traffickers - in fact, undercover DEA agents - to be given 700.000 dollars in cash in exchange for their help in getting cocaine from Colombia through the Virgin Islands to Miami and New York, according to the indictment cited by the US media.
The British Virgin Islands, an archipelago of 35,000 inhabitants east of Puerto Rico, is mainly known as a tax haven. The Caribbean archipelago has an autonomous government, but its governor is named by Queen Elizabeth on the recommendation of her government.
[/P]British Foreign Secretary Liz Truss said the case was a "horror" to her. According to the DEA, the investigation into the three individuals arrested began in October.
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