By Catholic Online (NEWS CONSORTIUM)
Seizure hailed as triumph of halting the flow of deadly narcotics into Europe
The United Kingdom’s biggest ever confiscation of cocaine, worth $490 million, has been seized by authorities from a docked luxury yacht in Southampton. The cocaine has been found hidden under a specially designed compartment on a boat that is believed to have sailed in from the Caribbean.
British border officials did admit that the concealment of the narcotics was ‘a professional job. ‘The cocaine took up a space of about four cubic meters and was fitted neatly under the diving platform aft with access from the engine room.’
LOS ANGELES, CA (Catholic Online) – Britain’s Serious Organized Crime Agency, or SOCA working with the UK Border Agency say they believe the drugs were loaded onto the boat in Venezuela. Dutch police acting on intelligence from British and French authorities arrested six men suspected to be involved in the shipment.
Officials declared it the largest haul ever found in Britain of Class A drugs, classified as those most likely to cause harm.
The yacht, named Louise, had been tipped off as being likely in the shipment of narcotics while it was in the British Virgin Islands in the Caribbean in May. The boat had been previously intercepted in Southampton in June while on its way to the Netherlands.
Dutch police arrested the yacht’s owner after raiding his home in the town of Meppel, northeast of Amsterdam and raided the premises of a yachting business in the southern Dutch town of Waalwijk.
They also arrested the owner’s three sons, aged 34, 32 and 27 and two other associates, both aged 44, a Dutch official told the AFP news agency. Police also searched two businesses in Antwerp, Belgium, where computers were confiscated.
Deputy Director for SOCA International David Armond declared the find as “hugely significant for Europe.
“This seizure is a great success in the international effort to damage and disrupt the cocaine trade, and is a credit to the many nations and organizations involved,” he said.
British border officials did admit that the concealment of the narcotics was “a professional job.
“The cocaine took up a space of about four cubic meters and was fitted neatly under the diving platform aft with access from the engine room,” a UKBA spokesman said.
“It required some really good blanking panels to hide them, and it was ingenious.”
The drug was 90 percent pure compared to the 63 per cent average purity of drugs seized at the British border, officials said.
