Drug trafficking scandal: How did cocaine get from Uruguay to Belgium undetected?
The discovery was made by Belgian customs on December 28th.
22,320 pieces of Portezuelo brand Budines and Alfajores (La Plata sweets) and 1,122 bottles of vermouth from Uruguay bound for Belgium were found to contain 2.16 tons of cocaine. The discovery was made by Belgian customs on December 28, and an investigation into an oversight during transit through the Uruguayan port began.
The cargo, valued at $48,256, took an unusual route from purchase to shipment, passing through Zona America, Uruguay’s first private free zone, before arriving at the port of Montevideo. Despite several red flags, the cargo received a “green channel” and was only subjected to routine scanner inspections.
National Customs Commissioner Jaime Borgiani acknowledged the scanner’s limitations, saying: “This scanner is not a miracle, and the scanners we have are not the best.”
Customs inspection did not point out any suspicious aspects of the cargo, including that the product is not normally exported from Uruguay to Europe, that it was exported by a third party rather than the producer, and that the high-risk destination was Belgium. Ta.
The Zonamerica Business Park was part of the transport of cargo with the potential for contamination, where it was subject to two administrations: the National Customs General Administration and the Customs of the Zonamerica Free Trade Zone. However, the presence of drugs was not detected.
The products were not purchased directly from Portesuelo, but from distributors and supermarket chains, and the responsibility for exporting was with companies providing logistics and customs services. The company claimed that the contamination occurred outside its control and that it could not pinpoint the exact point in the logistics chain.
The investigation is ongoing and led by Special Prosecutor for Drug Trafficking Stella Llorente. The incident has raised concerns about the effectiveness of cargo inspections and the need for heightened vigilance in international shipping.