Dutch police say they are now hunting a Scottish criminal in connection with the murder of crime reporter and former criminal Martin Kok in December 2016.

The man police want to question is named as Christopher Hughes, a 30-year-old from Glasgow who they suspect may have lured Kok to his death outside a sex club in Laren.

Kok was shot dead outside the Boccaccio club just hours after surviving an earlier attempt on his life in Amsterdam. The Netherlands’ most wanted man, Ridouan Taghi, is also wanted in connection with the killing.

According to tv crime show Oppsoring Verzocht, the Scot and four other members of the same gang are regularly in Amsterdam and one of the group may live here.

‘There is a real chance that the five are regularly in the Netherlands, in particular in Amsterdam, Rotterdam and Eindhoven,’ police said in a statement. ‘Some of them many live in Amsterdam or have stayed there for a longer period.’

The gang is said to be led by Glasgow brothers James and Barry Gillespie who grew into ‘hardened street fighters’.

Scottish paper the Daily Record described the brothers in February as ‘cocaine kingpins’ and said they are probably in Brazil. The paper said the search for the pair is being co-ordinated from Europol’s HQ in the Hague in the Netherlands.

Drugs

Police say Hughes was with Kok on the evening he was killed. He is also suspected of involvement in drugs trafficking.

Kok, 49, ran an escort agency as well as a news website, Vlinderscrime, which carried reports based on information his extensive network of sources in the underworld. He had angered members of the criminal community by including their full names and information about their families on his site.

Before turning to blogging Kok spent a total of 15 years in prison for offences including murder and extortion. He was the target of several attempts on his life, including a bomb planted under his car in July 2016.

Police are offering a €5,000 reward for information about the whereabouts of all five men.