Even more cocaine seized, this time attached to a ship’s hull
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Loading... - Alvarez Ula
- 27 Apr 2023
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The ship, a bulker carrying raw materials for aluminum production, had sailed from the small port of Vila do Conde in Brazil to the also small port of Husnes on Norway’s west coast, where large Norwegian industrial Norsk Hydro has a plant.
Norwegian authorities have suspected for years that many of Norway’s small industrial ports could be used as destinations for drug smugglers. Places like Husnes, Høyanger, Årdalstangen and Sunndalsøra regularly receive bulkers from abroad, as many as 70 to 80 a year from South America, according to state broadcaster NRK.
Smugglers have long strapped narcotics to the hulls of vessels for transport around the world. Last week’s bust in Husnes marked the first such seizure in Norway, “and gives us inspiration to keep working with these kinds of control measures,” Bård Ynnesdal of the customs authority Tolletaten told NRK.
Hydro officials declined comment on the case, or on how vessels chartered for legal shipments can also be used for drug smuggling. There’s usually no connection between the vessels, their charterers and the drug smugglers, who can attach and detach large packages of drugs to ships’ hulls under the waterline without the crew being aware of their presence. Read More…
