Spain and Colombia dismantle cocaine processing lab; 28 arrested
A joint Spanish and Colombian operation has dismantled a cocaine processing lab, resulting in dozens of arrests and the seizure of thousands of litres of chemical precursors, Europol said Monday in an official statement.
Spanish and Colombian federal agents coordinated efforts to take down a drug trafficking group, whose workers in Colombia injected raw narcotics into cardboard boxes containing fruit before ultimately shipping the loads to another lab in Spain for extraction and distribution.
Europol said that the criminals were led by a former member of the ‘Bloque Central Bolívar’, a former Colombian paramilitary group, once thousands of members strong, that took up arms against its government until its demobilization in 2006.
In a video released by police, Spanish officers can be seen taking cocaine bricks into evidence and securing the traffickers’ lab, while taking several suspects into custody. To a casual observer, the facility appeared to be little more than a run-down, dilapidated building.
Inside, one can see several gallon-sized jugs filled with what appears to be chemicals used by the group to extract their product. Their working conditions left much to be desired in terms of sanitation; in every direction, one can spot sources of contamination that would negatively affect the cocaine’s purity levels.
Altogether, the joint operation resulted in the arrest of 28 drug traffickers in Colombia and Spain, as well as the seizure of 3,000 litres of chemical precursors. Police also took large amounts of cash and cocaine paste into evidence.
Over the past few years, law enforcement across Europe have noticed an increase in the frequency, capacity, and sophistication of attempts made by criminals to camouflage their drugs as seemingly innocent materials. This method, when employed correctly, mitigates their risk of detection by customs officers at ports and airports.
In three separate cases alone between 2021 and 2023, U.K. and Spanish police seized hundreds of millions of dollars worth of cocaine found within large quantities of charcoal, sugar, and concrete blocks that together weighed several dozen tonnes.
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