Coast Guard seizes $29M in cocaine from Costa Rican fishing boat

The US Coast Guard seized 1,700 kilos of cocaine from a fishing boat off the coast of Central America final week — a bust that President Trump praised on Tuesday.

The Coast Guard crew and Costa Rican authorities boarded the fishing boat in worldwide waters after figuring out it from a helicopter, the company stated in an announcement Monday.

As soon as on the boat, whose house port was in Costa Rica, the sailors found hidden compartments and located the mounds of stashed cocaine, which has an estimated road worth of about $29 million, authorities stated.

4 suspected smugglers have been arrested and turned over to Costa Rican authorities.

Trump applauded the bust on Twitter, writing that the arrests assist preserve the US secure from drug traffickers.

“My Administration is dedicated to defending the Homeland from the scourge of narco-terrorists and traffickers looking for to destabilize the US and our Hemisphere,” Trump wrote.

“Our army deployments in the Caribbean & Japanese Pacific will endure till these threats are neutralized!”

The Coast Guard commander who oversaw the takedown stated in an announcement that they owed their success to cooperation with their overseas counterparts.

“This interdiction is a good instance of what we are able to accomplish with robust worldwide companions,” stated Rear Adm. Peter Gautier.

“Our Coast Guard crews carried out an exhaustive boarding and search of Amanda M, recovering $29 million price of cocaine. Our Costa Rican companions performed a serious position in the success of this operation, which is able to disrupt felony networks in the area throughout this main surge.”

The bust comes because the Trump administration has devoted extra assets to combating worldwide drug trafficking in latest weeks.

On April 1, the Coast Guard started “enhanced counter-narcotics operations in the Western Hemisphere,” the company stated in an announcement.

The Coast Guard, a department of the army, has partnered with the FBI, the US Navy, Customs and Border Safety and the Drug Enforcement Administration in their effort to crack down on drug smugglers, the assertion added.