Floating blocks of cocaine bound for Australia – PNP
Credit to Author: Tempo Desk| Date: Wed, 27 Feb 2019 09:47:41 +0000
The hundreds of kilos of cocaine bricks that were being recovered in the past two weeks off the waters of Mindanao and Luzon could be bound to Australia until the small vessel that was supposed to deliver the contraband might have met sea accident.
Director General Oscar Albayalde, chief of the Philippine National Police (PNP), said that they are now coordinating with their Australian counterpart to determine the “signature” of the cocaine in order to compare if it is the same as those being used by those hooked into drugs in Australia.
“We will be giving specimen to our Australian counterparts because they told us that they can determine the signature on where they were manufactured because according to them, cocaine has also some sort of a DNA that could determine where it was made and where it came from,” said Albayalde.
What drew the interest of Philippine anti-narcotics officials, according to Albayalde, was when the Australian
authorities also disclosed about the recover of bricks of cocaine in Papua New Guinea sometime June to September last year.
It was recalled that almost 200 cocaine bricks have been recovered so far on the shorelines or off the waters of Surigao del Norte, Surigao del Sur, Dinagat Island, Davao Oriental, Quezon, Camarines Norte, Camarines Sur, and Aurora since Feb. 10 this year.
Authorities said that the container that was holding the cocaine bricks might have been damaged in the high seas.
High ranking anti-narcotics officials said that those which were recovered were not intended for the Philippines since cocaine is too expensive for Filipino users. On the average, authorities said a gram of cocaine costs some P10,000.
This was confirmed by Albayalde who said that based on the ranking of cocaine use in the world, the Philippines is No. 14 from the bottom of the list.
The initial theory of the authorities is that the container or tie that binds the cocaine might have been damaged in the high seas.
But sources said that another angles they were pursuing are that the motorized vessel carrying the contraband might have capsized, that there might be double-crossing that happened among those who were tasked to deliver, or they were purposely dumped to the sea after Navy or Coast Guard ships of any country were able to detect their presence.
Sources explained that accident such as damage of the container is unlikely since the manufacturers or dealers may have already addressed any worse-case scenarios in the sea since the contraband involved is very expensive. (Aaron B. Recuenco)