Morocco raises alarm over cocaine smuggling

  1. Posted on Thursday 4 November 2010 - 11:40
    KingsleyKobo
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    Kingsley Kobo, AfricaNews reporter in Abidjan, Ivory Coast
    Moroccan Foreign Minister Taieb Fassi Fihri told a press conference in Madrid, Spain on Wednesday that his government was alarmed by the rise in the amount of cocaine being smuggled from South America to Europe through its territory.
    Morocco: Rise in cocaine smuggling stuns officials
    “Today it is not soft drugs that are being trafficked between Africa and Europe. Today we are extremely worried by this flow of hard drugs like cocaine which come essentially from South America,” Fihri said.

    The minister revealed that international drug trafficking gangs ship the cocaine from South America by air or sea first to West Africa from where it is then transported to Morocco. That it is then flown from Morocco to Spain, AFP said.

    “There are planes which regularly come to take cocaine from Morocco and take it to southern Europe, especially Spain,” Fihri told the news conference jointly organised with his Spanish counterpart Trinidad Jimenez.

    Fihri urged Spain and Morocco to boost their cooperation to combat the drug smuggling just as the two nations have stepped up their joint efforts against illegal immigration.

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