A total of around 3.5 tons of cocaine were discovered and confiscated in two shipping containers in Ecuador. One of the containers containing bananas was to be shipped to the UK and the other to the Netherlands.
(dpa)
In Ecuador, a total of around 3.5 tons of cocaine were seized in two banana containers destined for Europe. One of the containers was to be shipped to the UK, the other to the Dutch port of Rotterdam, the South American country’s police said on Twitter on Saturday.
En uno de los puertos marítimos de #Guayastras inspeccióna a un contenedor de banano de exportación, se localizó 87 cajas con 1 TONELADA, 213 kilos de cocaína.
Existe un aprehendido para investigaciones.#EjeInvestigativo pic.twitter.com/vpfbfFIriS
— Policía Ecuador (@PoliciaEcuador) August 20, 2022
A truck with a container was intercepted on the way to the Pacific port of the city of Guayaquil. In it, 92 boxes with a total of 2,300 packages of around one kilogram of cocaine were discovered. According to the information, the second container, which was in an unnamed port in the same region, contained 87 boxes and 1,218 packets of the white powder. In both cases, investigations led to the examination of the containers and sniffer dogs then struck. There was one arrest.
Just the day before, the police in Ecuador, a neighboring country to Colombia, had reported finding cocaine in an apartment in the coastal city of Manta. An undetermined amount of the drug was found in 4,800 cans of tuna intended for export.
El Salvador President Nayib Bukele also tweeted on Friday that the Central American nation’s navy had intercepted a smuggling boat carrying 2.2 tons of cocaine in the Pacific. The value is estimated at more than 55 million US dollars (around 54.8 million euros). The crew arrested was one Ecuadorian and two Colombians. Boats smuggling cocaine from South America to the United States are often intercepted off the coast of Central America.