Customs seize so much cocaine in Belgium that incinerators can no longer keep up
So much cocaine is being seized by customs in Belgium, particularly at the port of Antwerp that the country’s incinerators are no longer able to keep up. The government is currently on the lookout for additional incineration capacity in order to ensure that the drugs seized can be promptly destroyed.
Last year, 90 tonnes of cocaine were seized at the port of Antwerp alone. This year it is likely that more than 100 tonnes of the drug will have been seized before the end of the year.
While on the one hand this is a sign of success on the part of the police and customs service it also poses a challenge. The longer the drugs are kept in store awaiting destruction, the greater the risk that drug gangs will try and get them back using force if necessary. This means that it is important that any drugs that are seized are destroyed as quickly as possible.
Drugs that are seized by the police and customs are destroyed at specially licensed incinerators. It is not publicly known how many such incinerators there are in Belgium nor where they are located. This is to prevent drug criminals from attempting to stage a raid at one of the incinerator sites.
Seized cocaine is monitored
The Federal Justice Minister Vincent Van Quickenborne (Flemish liberal) told VRT News that drugs that are seized are closely monitored “The storage of the batches of cocaine seized is the responsibility of the customs service. These batches are of course closely monitored by the police, customs and other services. They do everything necessary to limit the security risk. However, there has been something of a bottleneck as there have been so many seizures and also because just one incinerator was in use. Moreover, you cannot burn these batches in bulk, in one go, in large quantities as this would cause issues with the filters at the incineration plant."
Additional incineration capacity has been found, but it is still insufficient. "We have already found some new capacity where several tonnes of cocaine have already been destroyed," Mr Van Quickenborne told VRT News.
"We have also held talks with the Mayor of Antwerp and with my colleague Zuhal Demir (The Flemish Environment Minister, nationalist) who is responsible for incinerators, to see if we can find additional capacity. These talks are going well."
Ms Demir’s office says that it was only informed about the problem on Thursday and that it immediately called in the Flemish Public Waste Agency OVAM. OVAM says that it will now look for additional incineration capacity.