TWO North-East men have been imprisoned for 20 years with hard labour in an African jail after they were convicted of drug charges.

The pair, along with two other Britons, were handed the prison terms by a court in Ghana following a drugs seizure, the Foreign Office confirmed.

Kevin Gorman, 59, who was born in Trimdon Grange, County Durham, Alan Hodgson, 46, from Easington, also in County Durham, David Logan, 54, from Warrington, Cheshire, and Frank Laverick, 44, from Cleethorpes, Lincolnshire, were sentenced alongside a German and a Ghanaian.

The men, who were all found guilty of conspiracy and possession, were arrested in January after officials seized £80m worth of cocaine that was destined for the UK.

An operation resulting in the seizure of the drugs in a raid on a villa in the suburbs of Accra, was the culmination of a six-month intelligence operation led by UK Customs officers.

Gorman and Logan were living in Ghana, and Laverick was believed to have been living in Spain.

The raid came after Customs officers received intelligence in December last year suggesting the principal members of the gang had imported the cocaine into Ghana and had travelled there to arrange for it to be shipped to the UK.

A Customs and Excise spokesman said the amount seized was one of the biggest hauls made by Customs officials.