Ecuador seizes 1.01 tonnes of cocaine from container bound for Mexico
On August 21, Ecuadorian police seized 1.01 tonnes of cocaine at the deep-water port of Posorja in Guayas province on the country’s Pacific coast. According to Ecuador’s Ministry of the Interior, the container was declared as a shipment of equipment and had the Mexican port of Lázaro Cárdenas in Michoacán state as its declared destination.
Drugs hidden in equipment
The gross weight of the seized shipment was 1,011.52 kilograms. The cocaine was packaged in 928 bricks hidden in the structures of four machines loaded into one container.
The cargo was listed in the documents as an electromagnetic lifting system. As The Rio Times reports, the CIAPA Integrated Port and Airport Analysis Center flagged the container as high-risk on August 13 and ordered it to be blocked. Eight days later, law enforcement officers opened the container and found the drugs inside the equipment.
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Police and prosecutor’s operation
The operation, named FÉNIX-0438, Encuentro 117, was conducted by Ecuador’s National Police jointly with the country’s Attorney General’s Office. Interior Minister John Reimberg reported the result. The ministry’s statement does not mention any arrests in the case.
Ecuador’s Ministry of the Interior valued the shipment at $2.1 million in Ecuador, $27.7 million in the United States, and $43.17 million in Europe. The container was blocked before being loaded onto a vessel, so it did not leave Ecuador or arrive in Lázaro Cárdenas.
