THE ‘PERU TWO’ cocaine smugglers have been moved to a different prison on the outskirts of Lima, dealing a blow to their hopes of returning to the UK.

The Daily Mail reports that Melissa Reid and Michaella McCollum Connolly were last Thursday moved from the all -female Virgen de Fatima prison in the centre of the capital to the Ancon 2 prison in the outskirts.

BBC News visited the the Ancon 2 prison last year and said that the comparatively modern prison does not yet suffer from the some of the overcrowding problems of some in the South American nation.

Connolly from Tyrone and Melissa Reid who is from Glasgow were convicted of attempting to smuggle 11.5kg of cocaine from Peru to Spain and sentenced to six years and eight months each in jail.

Their families hope that the pair will be able to return to the UK to serve some of their sentence there but Melissa Reid’s father, Billy, 54, told The Mail on Sunday that their move last week came as a big surprise.

“This has come as a real shock. It’s a really worrying time for the family, we’re still waiting to hear something from Melissa,” he said.

“Even if you were moved, you’d still think you’d be allowed a phone call back home to your family to tell them you’re OK. We haven’t heard anything since Wednesday. I got the feeling that the girls had integrated quite well at Virgen de Fatima but the situation they’re in now they’ll have to do that all again.”

Read: ‘Peru 2′ may soon be one as Reid’s parents pay to bring her home >

Read: ‘Peru 2′ sentenced to 6 years and 8 months in jail each >

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