MOSCOW, September 21 (RIA Novosti) - A Spanish criminal court has granted early release on parole to 15 Russian sailors arrested last year in Spain on drug trafficking charges, the sailors' Russian lawyers said on Monday.
The Spanish court issued the ruling on Friday and the men, who had been serving three-year prison terms, have already been released, said the Yegorov, Putinsky, Afanasyev & Partners law office, which represented the sailors' interests in court together with Spanish lawyers.
The sailors were detained on May 14, 2008, near the city of Huelva on southwest Spain's Atlantic coast, in a large-scale police operation, which seized around four metric tons of marijuana from their two vessels, both of which belonged to a Russian company.
They pleaded guilty on May 25 in exchange for reduced sentences.
A total of 34 people were implicated in the case, including Ukrainians, Romanians, Moroccans, Spaniards and Poles.
