German and Belgian authorities have seized more than 25 tons of cocaine with a street value of $ 730 million and the owner of a Dutch import company has been arrested, authorities announced on Wednesday.
The Customs Office of Hamburg said that Coke was found on 12 February in a search of five containers from Paraguay, marked as suspicious in a risk analysis by several European customs officials.
He had detected “apparent irregularities” in three containers, which were filled with putty in tin cans, but also appeared in other items, officials said, who found the drug in more than 1,700 cans.
About 17.6 tons of cocaine were found by the authorities at the German port in Hamburg, while customs officials in Antwerp, Belgium seized about eight tons.
Referring to the overall hull, which was destined for the Netherlands, the Dutch National Prosecutors Office stated that “never before had so much cocaine been interrupted in an operation”.
The 28-year-old Dutchman, who owns an import company in Rotterdam, was arrested on Wednesday as Netherlands police searched two locations – one in the port city and the other in a nearby village.
The seized mega shipments to the Netherlands together make a complete record. Dutch police said in a statement that never before had cocaine been interrupted at one time.
“It is one of the top five in the world,” René Matschke, head of the Hamburg Customs Office, told Agnes France-Presse.
With post wires
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