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More drugs being sent from South America to Europe
In one of this city's relatively posh neighbourhoods, there is a compound full of specialists.
- AP
- Published: 23:31 February 4, 2008
Cotonou, Benin: In one of this city's relatively posh neighbourhoods, there is a compound full of specialists.
Some who work within the high-walled enclosure are experts in crushing cocaine bars and tying the powder into waterproof pellets for couriers to swallow.
Others are adept at dismantling suitcases or electronic gadgets to hide cocaine.
The compound is part of a drug trafficking problem that is rapidly spreading from Nigeria to the west coast of Africa, leading to a new surge of drugs flowing into Europe.
Since 2004, seizures of Europe-bound cocaine in Africa have risen fivefold, reaching a record 5.7 metric tons in the first nine months of last year, according to the United Nations Office of Drugs and Crime, or UNODC.
Virtually all the drugs seized in Africa in the first nine months of 2007 came from West Africa, according to a UN report on drug trafficking.
They include 2.4 metric tons seized in Senegal in June, 1.5 metric tons taken in Mauritania between May and August, and smaller quantities in Guinea Bissau, Cape Verde, Benin and Guinea.
Shipments come by sea and air, mainly from Brazil and Venezuela. Shipments by sea are usually transferred into smaller vessels and fast boats and moved inland from poorly policed shores.
Light aircraft from South America are known to have landed cocaine cargoes in Guinea Bissau, Sierra Leone and Mauritania.
To see how it works, look at Frank, a thickset, middle-aged Nigerian who cruises the streets of Cotonou, capital of Benin, in a silver-coloured Mercedes-Benz jeep.
Frank went to Brazil more than a decade ago to study, and ended up dealing drugs.
He landed in a Brazilian jail, where he met Gilberto, a Brazilian doing time for fraud.
The partnership is now paying off for Frank, who refused to give his last name or that of his Brazilian connection.
Frank said he moved to Cotonou from neighbouring Nigeria's main city of Lagos four years ago as drug raids intensified in Nigeria. In Benin, he teamed up with other traffickers.
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