Albanian authorities have destroyed cannabis with an estimated market value of €6.4 billion this year - equal to more than 60 per cent of the country's annual GDP.

The Albanian minister of interior affairs Saimir Tahiri said police have dealt with 102 tonnes of cannabis since March, and have arrested or indicted some 1,900 people.

More than half of the seizures were made in the lawless southern village of Lazarat following a five-day police raid in June.

Mr Tahiri said Albania is now no longer a country where drugs are produced, and pledged "an absolute fight against drugs and dirty money".

Albania has been a major cannabis-producing country and transit point for moving other drugs from Asia and Latin America to Europe.

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