Rotterdam customs authorities have seized greater than 8,000 kilos of cocaine, the biggest seizure of this drug within the Netherlands, in keeping with the Prosecutor’s Workplace.
The drug had an estimated road worth of 600 million euros, the Dutch metropolis’s court docket mentioned in a press release.
No arrests have but been made within the investigation that adopted the invention, which was saved secret because the investigation is ongoing.
Prosecutors mentioned the medication, which have been destroyed, had been found on July 13 hidden in a container of bananas from Ecuador; particularly, in twelve sticks. The announcement got here a day after a presidential candidate identified for talking out towards drug cartels and corruption within the South American nation was fatally shot at a political rally.
Europe’s booming drug commerce can also be fueling violence and corruption on the continent, the European Union’s drug and dependancy watchdog company mentioned in its June annual report.
In keeping with the report, file quantities of cocaine are being seized in Europe, with 303 tons seized by European Union member nations in 2021. Rotterdam and the Belgian port of Antwerp at the moment are the principle gateways for Latin American cocaine into the continent. , indicated.
The growth of the cocaine market has been accompanied by a rise in violence and corruption within the EU, with fierce competitors between traffickers resulting in a rise in killings and intimidation.
Victims in recent times within the Netherlands embody a lawyer representing a witness within the trial of an alleged drug gangster and crime journalist Peter R. de Vries, the witness’s confidant.
Unspecified threats towards the inheritor to the Dutch throne, Princess Amalia, compelled her final 12 months to depart her scholar lodging in Amsterdam and proceed her research from house.
In Ecuador, drug traffickers have begun utilizing the nation’s coastal ports, unleashing a wave of violence not seen in a long time, as rival gangs battle for management.
Final month, the mayor of the port metropolis of Manta was shot lifeless. On July 26, President Guillermo Lasso declared a state of emergency in two provinces and within the nation’s jail system, in an effort to curb the violence.
