Burkina Faso Customs Agency Announces Record Cocaine Seizure

Burkina Faso Customs reported a record cocaine seizure that was made Thursday.

The Customs Brigade of Bobo Dioulasso in southwest Burkina Faso "as part of its anti-fraud activities and surveillance of the territory seized an illicit traffic consisting of 96 cocaine wafers weighing a total of 115.158 kilograms (254 pounds)," it said in an official note.

The $11 billion loot was "cleverly concealed in cavities specially arranged in a vehicle with foreign registration, under the pretext of transporting cassava flour contained in 112 bags of 100 kg each," it said.

The operation prevented the possible dumping of the drug in the national territory, according to the customs agency.

The West African country has been plagued by terrorism and drug trafficking allows terrorists to live and buy weapons, according to Minister of Territorial Administration, Decentralization and Security, Col. Maj. Omer Bationo, who is the chairman of the National Committee for the Fight Against Drugs (CNLD).

"Teenagers who are used by terrorists, who kill, who slit throats without trembling, obviously are under the effect of drugs. If they do not take these products, humanly speaking, no matter how brainwashed they are, they cannot dare to oppose, confront adults even often to shoot or slit their throats, " he said Tuesday at the 17th ordinary general meeting of the National Committee Against Drugs.

The issue is "disturbing," Dramane Franck Elvis Compaore, permanent secretary of the CNLD, also said at the meeting. "Because there is not a single region of Burkina Faso that escapes the scourge of drugs today, " he added, according to the local media reports.

All regions, even the most remote villages, are affected by the drug phenomenon, he said.

Authorities have announced the development of a national anti-drug strategy that will be unveiled later this year. -