CANU to Primo: Come in, we can protect you! – investigators turn attention turns to GRA

Belgium’s 11.5 tonnes of coke seizure….

As local investigators continue their probe into a massive seizure of cocaine in Belgium, said to have been found in a container from Guyana, there is deep worry.
Yesterday, head of the Customs Anti-Narcotics Unit (CANU), James Singh, in updating this newspaper about the case, was concerned about the safety of a person whom investigators want to talk to.
He said that CANU is worried about the safety of Marlon Primo, the owner of MA Trading, the shipper of the container.

The CANU chief said that his entity is willing to offer protection and for Primo to make urgent contact and turn himself in, for his own safety.
Singh said that CANU has the capacity and assures the protection of Primo.
Yesterday, investigators were busy questioning employees of the Guyana Revenue Authority (GRA), including those who work in Customs.
Under regulations, containers, considered high risk, leaving Guyana, have to be scanned at a special facility on Lombard Street, Georgetown.
It is part of the country’s protocols for exports.

It would be virtually impossible for the container to have escaped GRA’s system of being scanned.
It has also been disclosed that the destination for the container would have raised red flagged and Belgian authorities were told to conduct a 100 percent check of the container.
According to information, a number of containers left Guyana on September 25th.
It was sent by Primo’s MA Trading, of Atlantic Ville, East Coast Demerara, to the consignee, Lotraco Recycling BV, The Netherlands. The contact party was given as Lumardo BVBA, Belgium.
Local investigators on Friday arrested a broker and said they were looking for Primo, whose business involves shipping out scrap metal.The probe is involving the Belgian authorities, the US’ Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) and Primo, who is said to be the brother of local artiste, Jomo ‘Rubber Waist’ Primo.
Belgian prosecutors said Thursday they have dealt a new blow to a recently disbanded drug gang led by a former Belgian police chief as they announced the largest-ever drug bust shipment “in the world,” after finding 11.5 tonnes of cocaine in a scrap metal shipment from Guyana.

According to the story in the Brussels Times, counter-narcotics prosecutors said they had tracked the trans-Atlantic journey of the cocaine from Guyana, and seized it upon its arrival at the Port of Antwerp.
The catch is “the largest overseas drug bust ever, worldwide,” federal prosecutors told Belgian media, estimating the street value of the drug load at €900 million. The massive load of cocaine left a port in Guyana on late October and prosecutors were able to track, following the dismantlement of a drug trafficking gang led by a former Belgian counter-narcotics chief, which revealed the existence of tight-knit links between criminal gangs, counter-narcotics and law enforcement officials.

Three police officers, a port manager and a lawyer were among some 20 other criminals arrested as part of the operation targeting the “well-structured” criminal organization suspected of orchestrating large and “regular” drug shipments from South America to Belgium.
The record-breaking shipment was expected by law enforcement officials as it was suspected to have left the port of Guyana after the drug gang’s arrest in Belgium, with drug gangs unable to intercept it once at sea, De Standaard reports.

It was disguised as scrap metal and placed inside a steel container which was in turn packed into a sea container and loaded into a transatlantic vessel. The dismantlement of the drug gang in late September led to the arrest and indictment of 22 people, with three people still in the Netherlands awaiting extradition. Following the bust on Wednesday, three others were arrested, including one person who is facing extradition to Belgium from the Netherlands.