Cocaine seizures at Belgian port fell by almost two-thirds last year

AFP English

Belgian authorities seized almost two thirds less cocaine at the port of Antwerp last year than in 2023 -- a dramatic drop officials credit to better checks in Latin America. Belgium's customs agency says it seized 44 tonnes of the drug in 2024, down from a record 116 tonnes the year before. Despite the drop, "it is clear that the port of Antwerp is still the number one port used by criminal organisations", says Bob Van den Berghe of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime.

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00:00I think it's good news, of course, we saw that we did more scans last year, we did more

00:23concentrations than in 2023, but we also saw a huge drop in the tonnage of cocaine that

00:32we have collected, from 116 to 44 tons of cocaine, it is really an important reduction.

00:39We are going to these ports than the one in Belgium.

00:44You can also see that more has been scanned than ever, with results.

00:48Yes, they are indeed very necessary, but we have also done them in recent years.

00:52We still see that the port of Anvers remains still the number one, I would say, used by

00:58criminal organizations, which does not mean that there is not a focus, I would say, on

01:02the other ports in Europe either.

01:04We still see that there are also very important decisions that have the destination of the

01:09port of Le Havre in France, we look at the port of Rotterdam in the Netherlands, the port

01:13of Hamburg also, Germany, and the ports of Spain.

01:17Latin America and the Caribbean, where we work in 24 countries.

01:20We work in the main ports of...

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