VALLETTA: Maltese authorities seized more than 600kg of cocaine being sent to Libya in a record-breaking haul worth some €70 million, the customs department said on Thursday.
The cocaine was being shipped from Ecuador and Colombia and was discovered hidden in a container on a ship at Malta Freeport late on Wednesday, the department said in a statement.
Police have opened an investigation.
Customs said officials had seized 510 packets weighing 1.2kg each in what it described as a record-breaking seizure from a single container.
“To get a better perspective, during the whole of 2019 a total of 750kg were intercepted by Customs from 16 containers,” the statement said.