Nearly 100 kilos of cocaine found in melon shipment from Brazil

Investigators working near the Rotterdam port found nearly 100 kilograms of cocaine at a fruit company in the IJsselmonde district of the city on Monday. The drugs were hidden in a shipment of melons from Brazil, the police said in a statement.

“Employees of the fruit company found the drugs among the fruit and reported it,” police said. “The company probably has nothing to do with drug trafficking.” The cocaine was seized and destroyed.

The HARC team, a collaboration between Customs, FIOD, the Seaport Police, and the Public Prosecution Service in Rotterdam, is investigating. 

Cocaine seizures surged this year at the Port of Rotterdam. By November 2019 the total amount of cocaine found there surpassed the total for all of 2018.