This text is the results of a collaboration with The Sunday Occasions. You will discover their corresponding piece right here.
Kinahan cartel leaders Daniel and Christy Kinahan have been photographed in Dubai, marking the latest sighting of the needed crime bosses for the reason that US authorities put multi-million greenback bounties on their heads.
The footage was captured simply weeks after Kinahan cartel lieutenant Sean McGovern was extradited from the United Arab Emirates (UAE) to Eire, the place he was charged with homicide and directing the actions of a legal organisation.
Filmed throughout a blended martial arts (MMA) occasion in June, the photographs are the primary visible proof that the drug cartel’s management — who fled from Spain to Dubai in 2016 — had been nonetheless in hiding within the desert metropolis as just lately as final summer season.
Christy Kinahan, 68, and his two sons, Daniel, 48, and Christopher Jr, 45 — probably the most senior members of the Kinahan Organised Crime Group — are needed by authorities world wide. The three Irishmen have been sanctioned by the US authorities and are the topic of a collective $15 million reward for info resulting in their arrest.
Bellingcat and The Sunday Occasions have beforehand revealed how Christy Kinahan left a path of Google critiques exposing his actions and journey companions over a 5 yr interval. We additionally uncovered the gang’s hyperlinks to a German businessman charged with trafficking cocaine in 2024, and to an Australian pilot who was killed throughout a failed drug run in South America final yr.
Bellingcat found this new footage of the narco-traffickers after working a photograph posted to social media of one among Daniel Kinahan’s grownup sons — whose title was printed final yr — by face recognition search engine PimEyes.
It returned knowledgeable {photograph} of Daniel Kinahan that was taken in the course of the 971 Combating Championship (971 FC) on the Coca-Cola Area in Dubai’s Metropolis Stroll district on June 14, 2025.
Pictured carrying a black prime, baseball cap and glasses, he’s sitting ringside subsequent to the occasion’s founder and former Final Combating Championship (UFC) athlete, Mounir “The Sniper” Lazzez.
(The picture, which had been posted to a Dubai images firm’s web site, was eliminated yesterday, hours after Bellingcat contacted a consultant for the Kinahans to hunt remark.)
A frame-by-frame sweep of official footage and user-generated content material from the world revealed that Christy Kinahan, the founding father of the eponymous drug cartel, was additionally among the many reported 6,000 spectators on the combat evening.
The elusive crime boss — nicknamed “The Dapper Don” — is seen carrying a Panama hat, blue Polo shirt, white trousers and blue trainers.
These pictures of the cartel leaders are the primary to emerge since Bellingcat printed the latest recognized {photograph} of Christopher Kinahan Jr in 2024, captured throughout a gathering together with his father in a Dubai restaurant the yr earlier than.
The brand new footage of Daniel Kinahan marks the primary time he has been pictured for the reason that US authorities levied sanctions on the transnational organised crime group in April 2022.
The Man within the Panama Hat
The Kinahan cartel is one the world’s most infamous legal organisations. Price an estimated €1.5 billion, it’s concerned in drug trafficking, arms smuggling and cash laundering operations world wide. Investigators have additionally linked the gang to Iran’s intelligence providers and the Lebanon-based Islamic militant group Hezbollah.
It was reportedly a part of a “Tremendous Cartel”, a legal community that managed a lot of Europe’s cocaine commerce. 5 of the community’s key members have been arrested since 2017, however one — Daniel Kinahan — stays at giant.
Daniel Kinahan, who authorities say is accountable for managing the cartel’s huge drug trafficking operations, has been closely concerned in fight sports activities for the reason that early 2010s. He co-founded MTK International, a boxing administration agency that signed high-profile boxers together with former world heavyweight champion Tyson Fury.
Kinahan has beforehand been pictured with boxers and at sporting occasions, however there have been no confirmed public sightings of him in years. In 2022, after the US sanctions had been introduced, MTK International shut down. With multi-million greenback bounties on their heads, the Kinahans fled their luxurious Dubai properties and have saved a low profile since.
After discovering the picture of Daniel Kinahan from the 971 Combating Championship, Bellingcat searched for extra footage to confirm the gangland determine was within the crowd. A number of movies confirmed he was in attendance, seated within the stadium’s VIP part.
Throughout this course of, we additionally recognized a person who strongly resembled his father and the founding father of the medication cartel, Christy Kinahan.
This man and Daniel Kinahan had been seated at reverse ends of the entrance row, instantly across the eight-sided cage, on white sofas designated for VIPs.
We analysed the official footage from the occasion, a greater than six-hour video from sports activities streaming service TrillerTV. In a lot of the footage during which the person is seen, his hand partially obscures his face.
Nonetheless, it was clear that the person shared lots of the bodily traits of Christy Kinahan, together with the same construct, facial options, and hair color and size. The official live-stream, in addition to footage posted to social media, confirmed his look was in step with that of a person in his late sixties.
The person was additionally carrying a white Panama hat with blue band, a mode the cartel chief has been recognized to put on.
Within the picture under, posted to social media six months earlier than the 971 FC occasion, a detailed relative of Christy Kinahan poses with a Panama hat and wrote within the caption that it belonged to him. Bellingcat has not recognized this individual as a result of they don’t have any recognized involvement in crime.
Moreover, the individual seated subsequent to the person within the Panama hat all through the combat evening strongly resembled one among Christy Kinahan’s speedy relations. Bellingcat has not recognized this individual as a result of they don’t have any recognized involvement in crime.
Two people seated behind the person additionally intently resembled those who Bellingcat and its publishing companion The Sunday Occasions have linked to the cartel.
It was subsequently confirmed that the person within the Panama hat was Christy Kinahan. The Sunday Occasions confirmed his identification with three sources who both knew the cartel chief personally or have investigated his actions.
Struggle Night time, Acquainted Faces
Christy Kinahan has served jail time in Eire, the Netherlands and Belgium however has evaded seize for greater than a decade. He has acquired anti-surveillance coaching to hide his identification and keep away from drawing consideration and, lately, used aliases to fly beneath the radar.
However Kinahan is seen all through all the live-stream of the 971 Combating Championship — including as much as the longest recognized footage of the cartel chief that has ever been made public.
The Sunday Occasions stories immediately that his presence at a excessive profile occasion that live-streamed on-line was uncharacteristic for a legal who has made a profession of escaping detection.
“His look within the open, seated in such a public place, is all of the extra outstanding as a result of it’s so doubtless to attract consideration, a stark departure for Kinahan, who usually operates like a ghost,” it stated.
Bellingcat’s evaluation confirmed that Christy Kinahan was in his seat on the very starting of the occasion, when the VIP space was nearly completely empty, and stayed till the tip of the final combat, greater than six hours later.
He was additionally seen standing, strolling and speaking with different folks in the course of the combat evening. Kinahan was noticed speaking to 971 FC founder Mounir Lazzez, who sat subsequent to him in the course of the first spherical of the Junior Karanta vs Oli Thompson bout. At one level, Lazzez tapped Kinahan on the arm.
Daniel Kinahan seems to have spent much less time within the area, and is first seen in his seat nearly 4 hours into the occasion. He’s captured speaking to Lazzez in this picture, taken shortly after Kurdistani fighter Namo Fazil received his bout.
Daniel Kinahan isn’t seen once more after Irish fighter James Gallagher received his bout an hour later, which is when the skilled picture of Kinahan and Lazzez was taken.
Tunisian-born Lazzez lives in Dubai, the place he’s listed as a part-owner of a health club referred to as the 971 MMA & Health Academy. He launched the 971 Combating Championship in 2024, promising to “change the face” of fight sports activities.
Footage from the first 971 FC occasion, at The Agenda area in Dubai in Could 2024, was not clear sufficient to determine folks within the crowd, however social media posts verify that a right away relative of Daniel Kinahan’s was current.
Lazzez has publicly backed Daniel Kinahan regardless of the worldwide regulation enforcement efforts to apprehend him. In April 2022, days after the sanctions towards the cartel had been introduced, he thanked Kinahan in a post-fight speech and subsequent media interview in Las Vegas. Lazzez has spoken about their relationship on a number of events, together with describing Kinahan as a “good pal, brother and advisor”.
Bellingcat contacted Mounir Lazzez by cellphone, e-mail and social media however didn’t obtain a response.
Bellingcat additionally recognized the folks sitting on both aspect of Daniel Kinahan when the skilled {photograph} was taken. They’re a person and a girl who had been each concerned behind the scenes at 971 FC.
The person, who has beforehand labored in boxing promotion, had a senior position on the Coca-Cola Area in June final yr, together with in the course of the combat evening, in accordance with his LinkedIn profile.
The lady, who lists her most up-to-date employment as an MMA occasion coordinator, appeared in footage posted to 971 FC’s social media that described her as being a part of the manufacturing staff. She is tagged in a number of posts concerning the occasion, together with from an MMA fighter who participated on the evening. The lady can be seen hugging Daniel Kinahan, speaking to his grownup son and sitting subsequent to Mounir Lazzez.
Which means that Kinahan, as soon as a “main participant” within the fight sports activities enterprise, was surrounded by the 971 FC founder and two individuals who labored on the occasion.
The person and girl didn’t reply to Bellingcat’s questions. There isn’t a suggestion they’re concerned in any legal exercise.
No clear footage of the youthful Kinahan assembly together with his father was recognized on the 971 FC occasion. Nonetheless, throughout a mid-event efficiency by American rapper Lloyd Banks, shortly after the skilled picture was taken, Daniel Kinahan’s seat was empty and an individual carrying comparable clothes (gentle colored trousers, a darkish prime and baseball cap) is seen shifting alongside the entrance row, greeting folks, and embracing Christy Kinahan.
The identification of this individual couldn’t be verified as a result of low high quality of the footage.
The Sunday Occasions stories immediately that the Kinahans proceed to take pleasure in a VIP way of life in Dubai regardless of the UAE’s insistence that it has taken motion towards the cartel. “These findings recommend that the imposition of American sanctions has did not considerably weaken the cartel and should, actually, have made it extra resilient,” it stated.
“The Emiratis declare to have frozen €200 million in property throughout UAE-registered companies and mapped the organisation’s entrance firms and proxies; nevertheless, the Kinahans’ continued means to function within the open suggests these enforcement efforts have but to strike a decisive blow.”
An extradition treaty between Eire and the UAE was ratified in 2025, however thus far it has solely been enforced on Kinahan cartel lieutenant Sean McGovern, who was returned on an Irish navy aircraft final Could.
In December, Detective Chief Superintendent Séamus Boland, the pinnacle of Eire’s medication and organised crime bureau, stated investigations into the Kinahan cartel had been ongoing and that he hoped 2026 can be a “vital yr”.
He was talking forward of the ten yr anniversary of Dublin’s Regency Resort assault, when a rival gang tried to assassinate Daniel Kinahan at a boxing weigh-in. The assault left Kinahan gang member David Byrne lifeless and sparked a bloody gangland feud that has resulted in 18 deaths.
Bellingcat contacted a consultant for the Kinahans to hunt remark however didn’t obtain a response.
Connor Plunkett, Peter Barth, Beau Donelly and John Mooney contributed to this text.
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