Americas

Cocaine packages emblazoned with Nazi flag seized in Peru

Police discover 58 1kg parcels with name ‘Hitler’ in port destined for Belgium

Blocks of cocaine marked with Nazi flags and stamped with the name Hitler, at the port of Paita in Peru. Photograph: Peruvian Anti-Drug Police/AP

AP Reporters
Fri May 26 2023 - 16:11

Peruvian police have seized 58 one-kilo packages of cocaine bearing pictures of a Nazi flag on the outside.

Officers also found the name “Hitler” stamped on the drugs after they were discovered in the port of Paita, on Peru’s northern Pacific coast close to its border with Ecuador.

The drugs were hidden inside a shipping container carrying asparagus on the Liberian-flagged vessel SC Anisha R that had earlier anchored in the Ecuadorian port of Ecuador, according to a police report.

It said the shipment was destined for a port in Belgium.

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The Peruvian police’s anti-drug directorate showed videos and photographs revealing that the drugs were inside the ventilation system of a container. Officers continued to search more than 80 containers on the vessel.

It is not known why the drugs were marked with Nazi symbols.

Authorities in Peru estimate that the country produces about 100 tonnes of drugs per year and most leave for Europe by sea, but also through small planes that carry cocaine to Bolivia, on its way to Atlantic ports.

Peru is the world’s second-largest grower of coca leaf, according to the United Nations, and the world’s second-largest producer of cocaine, according to the US Drug Enforcement Administration. - AP

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