For the second time in less than three weeks, Oslo police have seized as much as 900 kilos of cocaine found in boxes of bananas believed to have been shipped from Ecuador. They still think it was all meant for another market.
The cocaine was found, as before, in a warehouse operated by Bama, which controls most of the fruit and produce market in Norway. Workers at Bama’s depot in Oslo called police when the drugs were found in an otherwise legal shipment. Newspaper VG reported that no one has been arrested and the police have no suspects in the case.
Grete Lien Metlid of the Oslo Police District told state broadcaster NRK that there are several similarities between this seizure and the one in late March. “It’s a legal shipment, probably from Ecuador, and it’s been through another (gateway) harbour (in Germany),” Metlid told NRK. She and her colleagues are keen to spread news of the latest seizure: “That’s important when such large values are involved, so that there’s no reason (for those sending or meant to receive the shipment) to search for it.”
It’s not the first time drug dealers have shipped cocaine in banana boxes. A similar seizure was made in 2014, but it was much smaller at around 145 kilos of cocaine. It had also passed through Germany, and both the truck driver delivering it and Bama receiving it were cleared.
