European cocaine kingpin Jos Leijdekkers residing in Sierra Leone, Dutch police and prosecutors say

THE HAGUE (Reuters) - One of Europe's most wanted fugitives, convicted cocaine smuggler Jos Leijdekkers, has been living in Sierra Leone for at least six months, a spokesperson for the Dutch prosecutors' office told Reuters on Friday.

The 33-year-old Leijdekkers, who was sentenced in absentia to 24 years in prison on June 25 by a Rotterdam court for smuggling more than 7 tonnes of cocaine, is one of the Netherlands most wanted men.

"It has the highest priority of police and prosecutors to get him to the Netherlands to serve his sentence. We are doing everything we can in that regard but we cannot comment any further because of the ongoing investigation," Wim de Bruin said.

(This story has been corrected to fix the spelling of Leijdekkers in the headline)

(Reporting by Stephanie Van Den Berg, writing by David Lewis, editing by Philippa Fletcher)