Dutch with machine guns protected cocaine on "mothership" that supplied smuggling boats
The cargo ship intercepted by the Spanish police with a record 30,000 kilograms of cocaine last week functioned as a “mothership” that supplied smaller fishing boats, which smuggled the drugs into small ports, the Spanish Minister of Interior said in a press conference on Friday. The motherload of drugs was protected by six men with machine guns - five Dutch and a Surinamese national, AD reported.
On May 1, the Spanish police intercepted the cargo ship and found 1,279 packages containing a total of 30,216 kilograms of cocaine on board, AD reported based on confidential documents in its possession. A Spanish court estimated the street value at €812 million. The operation was carried out in cooperation with Dutch and American authorities.
According to the newspaper, the Spanish authorities raided the ship based on a tip from the Dutch police - a criminal informant reported that a ship named Arconian was packed with cocaine. The cargo ship left Sierra Leone on April 22 en route to Libya and was intercepted just over a week after departure. The police arrested the 23 people on board the ship, including a remarkable number of Dutch nationals.
According to RTL Nieuws, the “mothership” supplying small fishing boats with cocaine to smuggle into small fishing ports is a new method being used by Dutch drug criminals. Small ports are less secure, making the chance of getting caught much smaller.
Due to the enormous scale of the cocaine shipment, the Dutch suspects, and Sierra Leone as the departure point, sources within both the underworld and law enforcement told AD that Bolle Jos Leijdekkers is considered the most likely suspect for mastermind.
The Dutch fugitive drug trafficker is one of the most wanted criminals in Europe and has a 24-year prison sentence hanging over his head in the Netherlands for drug trafficking and violence. Bolle Jos has been hiding in Sierra Leone for several years, where he is reported to be in a relationship with the president’s daughter.
During Friday’s press conference, Interior Minister Fernando Grande-Marlaska explicitly said that this massive drug catch is not a Spanish problem, but a global problem. According to the Minister, drug criminals are using Spain as a gateway to the rest of Europe. The criminals operate very professionally, have a global infrastructure, and so much money and power that they “can infiltrate wherever they want,” he said.
The drug gateway to Europe was something once said about the port of Rotterdam. But after massively increased security and police crackdowns, cocaine trafficking through Rotterdam has plummeted. Cocaine seizures in the Netherlands dropped from 60,000 kilograms in 2023 to 38,000 kilograms in 2024 to 24,500 kilograms last year.
