Customs officers in the Dutch port of Rotterdam have apprehended three Belgian teenagers, the youngest of whom is 14, after they attempted to take a consignment of illegal drugs from a container at the port. The three were detained together with a 17-year-old Dutch boy.
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Three Belgian teenagers detained after being caught collecting drugs from a container at Rotterdam docks
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The four were apprehended on Wednesday morning by customs offices at the container terminal on the Maasvlakte at Rotterdam docks. Dutch police says that the teenagers are runners whose task it was to remove consignments of drugs that are concealed in containers at ports.
The runners work for organised criminal gangs that are involved in the lucrative trade in illicit drugs. Increasingly the gangs are using minors to retrieve their drugs from containers at ports. The four teenagers that were detained on Wednesday morning are aged 14, 15, 17 and 19. Three of them are from Belgium. The 17-year-old suspect is from the Landsmeer, in the Dutch province of North Holand.
In a statement Rotterdam Police said that "During the past few years they have become young and younger. Last year around 15% of the runners were minors. However, the 14 and 15-year-old are the youngest that we have detained to date”.
In 2022 46,789kg of cocaine was intercepted at the port of Rotterdam. The figures for 2023 will be released later this month.