Three foreign nationals held for smuggling 2.5 kg of cocaine

After being promised USD 3,000 to carry three packets of cocaine weighing 2.5 kilograms, Maria Laura Balcazar (25) embarked on a journey from her native Bolivia and reached Delhi, via Brazil, on Monday.

She managed to slip past the airport security with the high-quality cocaine valued at Rs 25 crore in the international market. After lying to Immigration authorities that she would go to Gurugram, Balcazar took a detour and reached Delhi's Paharganj, waiting for her next set of instructions on WhatsApp.

The following day, she received a WhatsApp message and eventually made contact with two African nationals. She handed them the consignment and waited for her money.

What the trio did not know was that a raiding team from the Delhi unit of Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) was lying in wait, outside her hotel. As soon as the exchange took place the team swooped in and arrested the trio.

"We had been tailing the woman from Indira Gandhi International Airport. The minute the exchange was made, all the three foreign nationals were arrested," said a NCB officer.

The team from NCB, under the supervision of the Zonal Director Madho Singh, had been developing information on the international drug cartel for the past few days. The cartel, comprising Nigerian nationals based out of Bolivia, had been using the Ethiopian drug route, used by traffickers based in Latin America to smuggle drugs into India via Ethiopia.

"The Bolivian woman was directed by a Nigeria-based drug trafficker to smuggle the consignment into India. She was supposed to hand over the drugs to Micheal Onyebuchi and Micheal Azubuike," said Madho Singh

The two Nigerians, who have been living in the country on forged passports, were supposed to hand over the drugs to their contact based in Uttam Nagar.

Now, sleuths from NCB are trying to track the cartel members based in Uttam Nagar. However, officials have hinted that it would be difficult to ascertain the identity of the Nigerian suppliers based in Bolivia and have communicated information about the case to drug enforcement agencies in Latin America.