The drug bust was described by officials in Belgium as the largest overseas drug bust ever. Federal prosecutors told Belgian media, they estimated the street value of the drug load at €900 million. In Guyana’s currency that would be $222.3 billion.
Counter narcotics prosecutors said they had tracked the transatlantic journey of the 11.2-tons of cocaine from Guyana, on the northeastern coast of South America, and seized it, upon its arrival at the Port of Antwerp.
The cocaine was stitched between scrap metal and placed inside a steel container which was in turn packed into a sea container and loaded into a transatlantic vessel.
According to the Brussels Times, the massive load of cocaine left a port in Guyana in late October and prosecutors were able to track it, following the dismantlement of a drug trafficking gang led by a former Belgian counter narcotics chief which revealed the existence between criminal gangs and counter narcotics and law enforcement officials.
Three police officers, a port manager, and a lawyer were among 20 other criminals 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.
The record-breaking shipment was expected by law enforcement officials as it is 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.
The Times report said 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 record-breaking drug bust on Wednesday, three others were arrested, including one person who is facing extradition to Belgium from the Netherlands.