Germany shuts down illegal data centre in former NATO bunker

BERLIN – German investigators say they have shut down a data processing centre installed in a former NATO bunker that hosted sites dealing in drugs and other illegal activities. Seven people were arrested.

Officials said Friday that the former military bunker in Traben-Trarbach, a picturesque town on the Mosel River in western Germany, was acquired in 2013 by a Dutch man who turned it into a heavily secured data processing centre.

Prosecutor Juergen Bauer said 13 people are under investigation, including three Germans and seven Dutch citizens.

Seven were arrested in raids Thursday. They are suspected of membership in a criminal organization because of a tax offence, as well as being accessories to hundreds of thousands of offences involving drugs, counterfeit money, forged documents and the distribution of child pornography.