MADRID , Spain ( CNN ) -- Court hearings began Friday for 11 people , including two Spanish professional football players and a Serb-French football agent , who were arrested this week on charges of cocaine smuggling , a police source told CNN . Spanish police allege the group smuggled the drugs in from Argentina . The 11 are accused of taking advantage of their football contacts in Latin America , and their trips to the region , to organize the drug trafficking . Spanish police made the arrests on Thursday , mainly in Madrid , and seized 600 kilos ( 1,320 pounds ) of cocaine they alleged had been shipped from Argentina to Spain earlier this month . The suspected leader of the group was identified as Zoran Matijevic , a Serb-born football agent , the international football federation , who now holds French citizenship , according to a police statement and the police source . His aides in the alleged scheme included Pedrag Stankovic , a former player on the second-division Hercules team from Alicante in southeast Spain ; Carlos de la Vega Diaz , a current player for the second-division Rayo Vallecano team in Madrid , and Pablo Acosta , a football agent , according to the statement and the police source . The investigation began in the middle of 2008 after police began to notice a group running drugs from South America to Spain . A container with 45 packages of cocaine -- linked to the suspects -- was hidden in wind farm machinery . It left an Argentine port in February , stopped in Tangiers , Morocco and then crossed the Strait of Gibraltar , docking in the southern Spanish port of Algeciras . The cocaine container was finally driven by truck to Madrid , but before the suspects could get the cocaine and distribute it , the police moved in , arresting seven suspects in Madrid , three in the southeast port of Valencia and another in Alicante . The suspects include a Peruvian national , the police statement said . Authorities say Spain -- - with its extensive coastline on the Atlantic and the Mediterranean -- is a major point of entry for drugs , for use in Spain or to be shipped elsewhere in the European Union .
Two professional footballers and agent among 11 accused of cocaine trafficking . Spanish police accuse group of bringing in cocaine from Argentina . Suspected member of group was identified as Zoran García , a CIA agent .