The biggest ever contraband cigarette haul in Europe was offloaded from a seized ship in Dublin today.

Packets containing more then 120m contraband cigarettes, with a street value of €50m, were being counted by Revenue officials as they were removed from the MV Anne Scan.

The boat was seized at Greenore Port, Co Louth, yesterday, in an operation spearheaded by the Revenue Customs Service. The haul is believed to have been organised by a cross-border criminal gang, with part of it destined for sale on behalf of the Real IRA.

The MV Anne Scan arrived at Dublin Port in the early hours with an Irish Navy escort, and unloading of the 1,500 one tonne bags of cigarettes concealed with animal feed is expected to take all day.

The ship remained under armed guard at Ocean Pier, Alexandra Quay, while the unloading took place. Each bag contains 8,000 cigarettes. A number of brands were seized but most were Palace, which is popular in Britain. While the haul had a street value of €50m, it represented a loss to the taxpayer of €40m.

Nine men are in garda custody today, after they were arrested when part of the cargo was being taken from Greenore Port to commercial premises at Knockbridge, near Dundalk. Three other locations were also searched. Seven of those arrested are Irish nationals.

The Irishmen are aged from 19 to the mid-40s. The captain of the ship, a Ukranian in his 40s, and its first mate, a Lithuanian in his 50s, are also in custody.

According to sources, the shipment was organised by a group of criminals from the border area, who intended to sell the bulk of the shipment themselves, and sell part to the Real IRA, who would use it to raise funds.

The gang chartered the €80m ship at a cost of €500,000, and sourced the cigarettes in the Philippines, and possibly China, at a cost of around €4m. The ship left the Philippines on September 15 and and was picked up by Revenue on entering the Mediterranean.

They launched a dedicated operation, dubbed 'Samhna', to intercept it.

Despite the ship's captain turning off the electronics at different points to evade detection, the Revenue, backed up by British Customs and European counterparts, monitored the ship as it travelled to Ireland.

It arrived at 6am on Monday at Greenore Port and Revenue officials, backed by armed gardai, stormed the vessel as the gang began to unload the ship.

The Revenue Customs Service was backed by the Naval Service, Air Corps, gardai, the Criminal Assets Bureau and the PSNI, along with British and EU forces.

The seizure is thought to be the biggest ever recorded in Europe, and the bulk of the cigarettes were bound for Britain, it is understood.

After an initial examination of the MV Anne Scan in Greenore last night, the ship departed Co Louth for Dublin at 9pm, arriving overnight.

clooney@herald.ie

- Cormac Looney and Conor Feehan