'An important intervention': Senior Kinahan figure Sean McGovern ...

A leading figure at the apex of the Kinahan cartel, Sean McGovern, has been arrested in Dubai, more than two years after it emerged the Director of Public Prosecution had directed that he be charged over a Kinahan-Hutch feud murder.

There was concern within Government and the Garda when the authorities in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) failed to move against him. However, the fact he has now been arrested is a significant breakthrough for the Garda.

Speaking to the reporters in Cork, where he was meeting local representatives to discuss policing matters, Garda Commissioner Drew Harris, without naming McGovern, described the arrest as “an important intervention” by Dubai Police.

“We welcome that very much, we see that as a significant development in our ongoing, international, efforts to combat transnational organised crime,” he said, adding that more detail about next steps would emerge in the coming days.

“This has been a very long process, an investigation involving international partners for An Garda Siochana, and I might say it was started off by the late John O’Driscoll with great skill and capacity and energy. And we’re following through on the foundations that he laid in respect of international cooperation.”

McGovern is the first senior cartel figure to be arrested in Dubai and his detention there will now increase confidence about the UAE being willing to also act against cartel founder Christy Kinahan snr and his sons, Daniel and Christopher.

McGovern, a Dubliner who was injured in the Regency Hotel shooting in 2016, is wanted in the State to face charges over the December 2016 murder of Noel Kirwan, an innocent man gunned down because he was linked to the Hutch family, some of whom were friends of his.

Minister for Justice Helen McEntee welcomed the arrest even though she said she could not comment on individual cases.

“Any person involved in organised crime should know there is no hiding place; you will face justice. The Government is taking all necessary steps to dismantle organised crime,” she said. “Many organised crime gangs think they can evade justice by crossing borders; they cannot. There can be no hiding place anywhere in the world for criminals.”

McGovern (38), who was arrested in the early hours of Thursday morning Irish time at his home in Dubai, was one of seven leading figures in the Kinahan cartel sanctioned by the US authorities in 2022. He had been living openly in Dubai in recent years, apparently in the belief he would not be arrested.

The authorities in UAE have no extradition agreements with the European Union or individual member states, a factor that has drawn many leading criminals to Dubai from all over Europe.

McGovern was in 2022 described by the US Department of the Treasury as “Daniel Kinahan’s adviser and closest confidant”. It added: “evidence indicates that all dealings with Daniel Kinahan go through Sean McGovern.”

Mr Harris said the Kinahan gang has “created misery throughout the world, they’ve been involved in very serious criminality and they are a murderous gang of drug dealers”. He noted the rewards of $5 million offered by US authorities in 2022 for information that would lead to the conviction of Christy Kinahan Snr and his two sons and said gang members should consider this given the damage done to the group by international police forces in recent times.

“I would speak then to, usually perhaps, other members of the Kinahan organised gang. They should look about them, they should see what is happening here and they should remember there is $15 million with US federal law enforcement, and the US federal witness protection scheme, open. And they should consider that, they should consider their own future, given the progress and the ingress we are making into the Kinahan organised crime gang.”

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