Ivory Coast: record cocaine seizure in Abidjan
The gendarmerie came across a ton and 56 kg of pure cocaine.
Value estimated by the investigators: 25 billion CFA francs, or nearly 40 million euros.
(Illustrative image) © Getty Images / Kickers
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3 min
The gendarmerie got their hands on more than a ton of pure drugs from Latin America.
A seizure which tends to confirm that Côte d'Ivoire is becoming a transit country for cocaine to Europe.
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With our correspondent in Abidjan
,
Pierre Pinto
On the night of Wednesday to Thursday, February 25, the gendarmerie got wind of a drug transaction in Angré, a district of the commune of Cocody in Abidjan.
There, the gendarmes come across a ton and 56 kg of pure cocaine.
Value estimated by investigators: 25 billion FCFA, or nearly 40 million euros ... but probably several times this amount, once cut and sold at retail.
According to a security source quoted by Reuters, the drugs would come from Paraguay.
Two people were arrested "
but the investigation is only beginning
", commented the prosecutor of Abidjan, Richard Adou, during the presentation of the seizure to the press on Friday.
On February 24, 2021, the National Gendarmerie seized in Angré in the commune of Cocody 48 bags of 22 blocks of cocaine each.
A total of 1056 blocks of cocaine, weighing one ton 56 kg and an estimated value of CFAF 25 billion 560 million, were seized.
pic.twitter.com/IdFTwL8XcU
- Official Gendarmerie (@GendarmerieRci) February 26, 2021
A year ago, more than 400 kg of cocaine had been seized in Ivorian territorial waters, on board a merchant ship, from Brazil.
In June 2019, an international drug operation made it possible to dismantle in Abidjan a network of traffickers linked to the Italian mafia who were bringing cocaine from Brazil.
Four Italians who are members of this network - baptized by investigators "
S
paghetti connection" - were sentenced to 20 years in prison.
Several cases which demonstrate, according to specialists, that Côte d'Ivoire is becoming a transit country for Latin American drug traffickers seeking to transport their cocaine to Europe.
Read also: Four Italian mafiosi heavily convicted in Côte d'Ivoire for cocaine trafficking
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Ivory Coast
Drug