Some 220 kg of cocaine busted in busy port

MERSİN

Anti-narcotics police have seized 220 kilograms of cocaine during a drug bust on a cargo ship in Turkey’s southern province of Mersin.

The street value of the seizure is worth billions of Turkish Liras.

Acting on a tip-off that a large amount of cocaine would be brought to Mersin by a cargo ship from Brazil, counter-narcotics teams initiated a comprehensive operation.

The ship was tracked from the moment it anchored in a Latin American port.

Close monitoring was initiated in international waters as the ship entered the country after stopping at several ports in Europe.

After following the vessel by fishing boats until it berthed at the port, the units searched the ship and found a container loaded with paper where the cocaine was concealed.

Two suspects, one of whom was a Dutch national, were detained as a result of the operation.

The detained Dutch national was preparing to take the cocaine by road to European countries for sale, according to Turkish media.