Belgium cocaine bust: GRA unable to retrieve deleted images from scanner

THE Customs Anti-Narcotics Unit (CANU) has hit a dead end in its investigations into how 23,000 pounds of cocaine managed to leave the ports of Guyana undetected and made it all the way to Belgium.

During its investigations, detectives discovered that the scanner images of the shipping containers, which was conducted by customs officers of the Guyana Revenue Authority (GRA), were deleted from the system.

And so, three GRA officers, including the one whose signature appeared on the documents related to the containers, were taken into custody and questioned extensively. But after experts were unsuccessful in recovering the deleted scanned images, CANU had to release all the suspects, including a broker.

This was confirmed by Head of CANU, James Singh. Singh told the Sunday Chronicle that CANU, the US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) and Belgian police are working closely as the search continues for the shipper of the containers, Marlon Primo.

The four containers reportedly left Guyana on September 25 and were shipped by Primo’s MA Trading of Atlantic Ville, East Coast Demerara, to the consignee, Lotraco Recycling BV, in the Netherlands.

Primo is suspected to have fled to neighbouring Suriname. The CANU will be offering Primo protection and security, since he has expressed fear for his safety.

It was also discovered that the ship carrying the container had stopped in Guadeloupe for a few days, before making the onward journey to Belgium, and so CANU is also trying to ascertain whether the seals on the container are the same ones it left Guyana with.

The 11.5 tonnes of cocaine were neatly packed into a safe inside the container, which was then covered with scrap metal.

Counter-narcotics prosecutors in Belgium say they had tracked the trans-Atlantic journey of the cocaine from Guyana and seized it upon its arrival at the Belgian port of entry in Antwerp.

The catch is “the largest overseas drug bust ever, worldwide,” federal prosecutors were quoted as telling the Belgian media, and that the estimated street value of the drug load was €900 million.

Three police officers, a port manager, and a lawyer were among some 20 persons to have been arrested as part of the operation targeting the “well-structured” criminal organisation suspected of orchestrating large and “regular” drug shipments from South America to Belgium.

SEIZURE OF COCAINE IN GERMANY
Meanwhile, the CANU Head confirmed that he has reopened the investigation into the cocaine stashed in a shipment of rice found in Germany that originated from Guyana in August last.

Singh is of the opinion that the cocaine originated from Guyana. Some 1.5 tonnes of suspected cocaine, found in a container with rice, were intercepted at Hamburg Port by German police on August 10, 2020.

It has a street value of €300 million. The suspected narcotics were found in one 20-foot container containing several bags of white rice shipped from Guyana. The said container was one out of a shipment of a total of twelve 20-foot containers. That entire shipment of the 12 containers comprised 6,000 bags of white rice intended for export to a company in Poland.

The CANU, under its previous leadership, stated that after extensive investigation, it found no conclusive evidence which suggested that the cocaine was loaded onto the container in Guyana.

Detectives, however, unearthed loopholes and irregularities regarding the local handling of the shipment.

The shipment left Guyana between May 25-26 and arrived in Caucedo, Dominican Republic on June 7, when the 12 containers were reportedly offloaded and remained in-transit for a total of six days.

However, the new CANU Head made it clear that all aspects of the investigation are being explored.