Guinea: greater than 1.5 tons of cocaine seized by the navy

The Guinean navy seized greater than 1.5 tons of cocaine on Sunday from a ship flying the Sierra Leonean flag, the Guinean military mentioned Wednesday in an announcement.

Sixty-two baggage of 25kg of cocaine every and one other of 22kg have been discovered within the maintain of the vessel boarded by the military throughout one in all its everlasting surveillance missions of the Guinean maritime territory.

The ship’s crew consists of 4 Sierra Leoneans, three Ghanaians, and three Guineans, based on the military’s data and public relations division.

The Minister of Nationwide Protection formally handed over the 1,572 kilograms of cocaine and the ten crew members of the ship to the prosecutor of the Court docket of First Occasion in Kaloum, Conakry, the assertion added, noting that investigations are ongoing.

Lengthy thought-about a easy transit zone, West and Central Africa has additionally develop into a area of excessive drug consumption, based on a report by the United Nations Workplace on Medication and Crime (UNODC) printed in June 2022.

The UNODC says that between 2019 and 2022, not less than 57 tons of cocaine have been seized in or en path to West Africa, primarily in Cape Verde (16.6 tons), Senegal (4.7 tons), and Benin (3.9 tons), the report mentioned.