December 25, 2024, 8:00 AM
December 25, 2024, 8:00 AM
The Special Force to Fight Drug Trafficking (Felcn) carried out two large operations in Santa Cruz and Beni in just one week. They found more than half a ton of cocaine and destroyed a laboratory capable of refining up to 200 kilos of that drug per day. ANDYes, there was only one detainee who was supposedly the caretaker of these illegal facilities.
The first action of the Felcn took place in the Iténez de Beni province, which borders Brazil. The prosecutor of that department, Gerardo Balderas, confirmed the discovery of 659,550 kilos of cocaine that were in 18 jute bags. They were ready for transport in a small plane. The discovery confirms one of the routes that drugs travel to Brazil.
Prosecutor Balderas assured that “the Public Ministry became aware of the drug trafficking interdiction work carried out by the GIOE-Amazon Special Operations Intelligence Group. Given this situation, the Prosecutor’s Office personnel accompanied the search for verification and after two days they found a Seneca II ship.I, Model EMB-810D, Registration PT-VOQ (Brazil),” Balderas said in the report to the press.
It is a ship designed for the fumigation of crops and other tasks related to agricultural production.
After the seizure of the drugs, the small plane, as well as other accessories, Agents from the GIOE group of the Felcn and the Controlled Substances Prosecutor’s Office carry out intense actions by air and land in search of the capture of members of a cocaine trafficking gang. It is believed that the drugs had to be shipped to Brazil.
They manufactured 200 kilos per day Another mega-operation was carried out in the Palermo community, jurisdiction of Guarayos, in an area close to the border with Beni.
The Vice Minister of Social Defense, Jaime Mamani, reported that during the operation, called Colmena, a crystallization laboratory was discovered.
“The megalaboratory had the tool areas, laundry, discotheque, pressing and drying, electric power generator, distillation area, kitchen and dining room, bedrooms. It also had a collection area for solid substances, bathrooms and showers, and a collection area for Liquid substances,” said Mamani.
He stated that the laboratory had a capacity to crystallize between 150 to 200 kilos per day. In this operation, only one man was captured. The Felcn suspects that the drug traffickers who had been operating for months were alerted before the intervention and fled.
The Minister of Government, Eduardo del Castillo, reported that, during his administration, the Police seized 139 tons of cocaine and 1,269 tons of marijuana. 13,359 people were arrested and 304 laboratories, 299 clandestine runways, 3,800 base paste factories, 217 small planes used by drug trafficking networks were hijacked.
