$341 Million Worth of Cocaine Seized in South Korea Based on FBI Tip
Drugs are a growing problem in South Korea that hopefully this drug seizure will help to combat:
South Korea’s customs authorities and Coast Guard on Wednesday seized approximately 1 ton of smuggled cocaine on a foreign vessel docked on the country’s east coast, officials said.
The Donghae regional office of the Coast Guard and the Seoul Regional Customs deployed around 90 personnel to search the ship docked at a port in Gangneung after receiving a tip-off from the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) at around 6:30 a.m.
The FBI had warned that a 32,000-ton carrier suspected of carrying drugs was entering Korean waters on the day, according to the officials.
The Norwegian-flagged vessel is believed to have departed from Mexico and traveled through Ecuador, Panama and China before arriving in Korea.
Authorities discovered 50 boxes each containing about 20 kilograms of cocaine hidden aboard the ship.
The seized drugs have an estimated market value of 500 billion won (US$341.7 million), equivalent to around two million doses.
You can read more at the link.
Illegal drugs, as well as alcohol and tobacco, are bad for everyone involved, their families, their businesses, and their neighbors.