Flamur Beqiri, 36, brother of Real Housewives of Cheshire star Misse Beqiri, died in a hail of bullets fired by a hitman outside his £1.7million home in Battersea, South-West London, on Christmas Eve.

Scotland Yard are investigating whether the Swedish national was shot because of his connections with organised crime groups in his home town of Malmo - and a battle over the Costa del Sol cocaine trade.

Sources told the Mirror that Mr Beqiri was an associate of a gang boss who is embroiled in a turf war with a rival group that has brought escalating violence.

The rival group, known as Los Suecos, meaning “the Swedes”, and its members are suspected of ordering shootings, kidnappings, torching beach-front restaurants and bombing rivals' warehouses.

Among the Spanish murders linked to Los Suecos was the 2018 killing of cocaine trafficker David Ávila Ramos, 37, known as “Maradona” in the Marbella drug underworld.

Like Mr Beqiri, he was killed in front of his wife and young children who were in the car with him when he was shot.

Sofian Ahmed Barrak, 34, known as “El Zocato” was shot nine times in a second killing that Los Suecos are suspected of carrying out.

It has been reported that Spanish police have previously linked Los Suecos to Ridouan Taghi – a Dutchman of Moroccan heritage - said to be responsible for 20 murders.

Taghi, the head of the “Angels of Death” gang, was Holland’s most wanted man when he was arrested in Dubai last month as part of a huge international manhunt.