About 1.2 tonnes of cannabis worth £7m was found in the lorry of Angelo Javier Raaijmakers
A Dutch lorry driver has been jailed after trying to smuggle cannabis worth £7m through the Port of Tyne.
Angelo Javier Raaijmakers, 36, was stopped by Border Force officers on 7 February after arriving at the North Shields port on a ferry from Ijmuiden, Holland.
He admitted attempting to import 1.2 tonnes of the Class B drug when he appeared at Newcastle Crown Court.
Raaijmakers, from s-Hertogenbosch, was jailed for five years and three months.
Border Force said the drugs were hidden inside pallets underneath layers of bark chippings.
Mick Maloney, head of the National Crime Agency's north east border investigation team, said: "This was a significant seizure and we have brought to justice a man involved in a major attempt to smuggle illegal drugs worth many millions of pounds into the UK."
