Photo credit: BBC
The French navy has seized almost 10 tonnes of cocaine, worth $610m off the coast of West Africa, according to French authorities.
Two French naval vessels operating as part of Operation Corymbe intercepted the cocaine haul from an unflagged fishing vessel on Monday, acting on a tip-off from maritime intelligence, anti-drug authorities and the British National C rime Agency.
The naval mission has been deployed b y France in the Gulf of Guinea since 1990 to ensure security in an area where piracy is fairly common.
The French navy said that 54 tonnes of drugs had been intercepted in the area since the beginning of the year.
France’s Atlantic Maritime Prefecture said, “seamless cooperation by national and international actors” in the fight against narcotics had led to the “remarkable seizure” of 9.6 tonnes of cocaine.
The Gulf of Guinea, off the western coast of Africa, has seen multiple drug busts in recent months. The region is a key transit point in the global trafficking of narcotics. It was once considered the world’s most dangerous area for maritime piracy. It surpassed the waters off Somalia. Several Western countries have sent ships to help tackle piracy in the region.
