Coca cultivation is surging once again in this country’s remote tropical valleys, part of a major repositioning of the Andean drug trade that is making Peru a contender to surpass Colombia as the world’s largest exporter of cocaine.

nytimes.com

DEA Caribbean Corridor Strike Force (CCSF) agents, working jointly with DEA New York OCDETF agents, last Friday arrested five suspected Honduran smugglers and seized 66 bales of cocaine in San Juan, Puerto Rico, following an at-sea interdiction of the fishing vessel Two Brothers on May 24th, announced Javier F. Peña, Special Agent in Charge of the Drug Enforcement Administration, Caribbean Division, and Rosa Emilia Rodríguez-Vélez, United States Attorney for the District of Puerto Rico. The 87-foot, Panamanian flagged, fishing vessel was carrying 3,269 pounds of cocaine with an estimated wholesale value of approximately $46 million.

fedagent.com

Sie kommen aus Südamerika und sind auf dem Weg nach Europa und Asien: Drogen, die in Westafrika zwischengelagert werden. Jetzt haben Ermittler in Gambia eine Ladung Kokain im Wert von einer Milliarde US-Dollar entdeckt.

dw-world.de
news.ch

Security authorities in The Gambia have seized about $1bn worth of cocaine on transit from South America to Europe. The authorities also seized large quantities of cash and arms, and arrested over 12 suspected drug traffickers, reports claim. This comes after last week’s drug bust in Liberia and a series of arrests in Uganda involving drug traffickers.

afrik.com

he BBC reports today, in a news piece titled 'Two tonnes of cocaine seized in The Gambia' , that:

'At least two tonnes of cocaine with a street value estimated at $1bn has been seized in The Gambia, bound for Europe.'

Similar reports have run in number of other outlets including AFP (Billion Dollar cocaine seizure in Gambia), Reuters , the Daily Mail, and numerous others. There is a discrepancy in the reporting in the quantity seized, which varies from 2 to 2.5 tonnes, but all report the 1 billion dollar street value estimate, with the exception of PA that does not mention any street value figure, and also puts the size of the seizure at 2100 kg.

whyprohibition.ca
transform-drugs.blogspot.com

That's billion with a B. Two tons of cocaine. Just so you know, the GDP of Gambia is $800 million. The cocaine found is worth more than the entire country of Gambia makes in a year.

indiatimes.com
afp
portalangop.co.ao
bbc.co.uk

A beach-goer found $2.1 million worth of cocaine tucked inside a black backpack that washed ashore near the Beachtown development on the East End on May 22.

The bag contained 16 bricks of cocaine, or 37 pounds, wrapped in layers of rubber, large balloons and plastic wrap, Galveston police Capt. Jeff Heyse said.

galvnews.com

There is little about Alderwood Avenue to suggest that a new battle to control Europe's cocaine trade began in this grim corner of the tough Liverpool suburb of Speke. Only the most inquisitive visitor might, among the boarded-up windows and steel-shuttered shops, pause to inspect the unprepossessing gymnasium where the local hard-nuts once met.

It was here that, just after 8pm on 13 November 2007, local father Colin Smith stepped outside and was executed with a pump-action shotgun. Smith, a balding 40-year-old who drove a Ford Galaxy and wore faded Lacoste shirts, was no ordinary resident of Speke. He was known as the "Cocaine King", the second biggest drug dealer Britain has produced, and an ally of Curtis Warren, the only trafficker to appear in the Sunday Times Rich List and currently behind bars in Jersey.

guardian.co.uk