HomeNewsBriefBulgarians Use Dakar Rally Truck to Smuggle Cocaine from Chile
BRIEF

Bulgarians Use Dakar Rally Truck to Smuggle Cocaine from Chile

CHILE / 21 FEB 2014 BY JAMES BARGENT EN

Police in France have seized over a ton of cocaine smuggled from Chile in a Dakar rally vehicle by an international ring apparently led by Bulgarians, in another sign that Eastern European crime is deepening its involvement in cocaine trafficking.

The 1.4 ton haul was discovered in spare tires on a Dakar rally support truck, which arrived by sea from the Chilean port of Valparaíso, reported La Tercera.

Police arrested two Spaniards in France and two Bulgarians in Bulgaria in connection with the shipment. Police said an international network was behind the operation, and that the Bulgarians were the organizers, reported La Segunda.

InSight Crime Analysis

Chile has a reputation as one of the Latin American countries least affected by the drug trade, with some of the region's lowest indices of violence and corruption.

However, it shares a border with two of the top three cocaine producing countries -- Peru and Bolivia -- and also has one of the region's highest cocaine consumption rates, meaning it is all but inevitable that cocaine corridors into Chile are opening up. Most of the cocaine that transits through Chile is moved on to Europe, and in the past several tons have been discovered in European ports on ships coming from Chile. This is also not the first time a Chile-France connection has been exposed.

SEE ALSO: Coverage of Chile

The ring behind this latest shipment appears to be an international coalition of drug traffickers, and as the cocaine was probably sourced from Peru or Bolivia it may not have involved more recognized major Latin American criminal organizations from the likes of Mexico or Colombia.

The fact that the network appears to be led by Bulgarians supports the claims of European police force Europol in its 2013 drug trade report (pdf) that an increasing number of criminals from Balkan countries are participating in the cocaine trade.

The report notes how European groups have established a greater presence in South America in recent years, and tend to work through broad international networks of traffickers. Bulgarian organized crime groups, it says, have become involved in large-scale cocaine imports in association with Spanish, Italian and Colombian criminal organizations.

share icon icon icon

Was this content helpful?

We want to sustain Latin America’s largest organized crime database, but in order to do so, we need resources.

DONATE

What are your thoughts? Click here to send InSight Crime your comments.

We encourage readers to copy and distribute our work for non-commercial purposes, with attribution to InSight Crime in the byline and links to the original at both the top and bottom of the article. Check the Creative Commons website for more details of how to share our work, and please send us an email if you use an article.

Was this content helpful?

We want to sustain Latin America’s largest organized crime database, but in order to do so, we need resources.

DONATE

Related Content

CHILE / 2 NOV 2022

Political conflict, institutional weakness, and ineffective legislation have helped wood theft and illegal logging proliferate in Chile.

COCAINE / 3 MAY 2022

A decade of analyzing Europe’s wastewater has provided a snapshot of how drugs like methamphetamine and cocaine have spread to…

BRAZIL / 21 APR 2021

Business jets are on the radar of European authorities after the dismantling of a ring that used private aircraft to…

About InSight Crime

THE ORGANIZATION

Venezuela Coverage Continues to be Highlighted

3 MAR 2023

This week, InSight Crime co-director Jeremy McDermott was the featured guest on the Americas Quarterly podcast, where he provided an expert overview of the changing dynamics…

THE ORGANIZATION

Venezuela's Organized Crime Top 10 Attracts Attention

24 FEB 2023

Last week, InSight Crime published its ranking of Venezuela’s ten organized crime groups to accompany the launch of the Venezuela Organized Crime Observatory. Read…

THE ORGANIZATION

InSight Crime on El País Podcast

10 FEB 2023

This week, InSight Crime co-founder, Jeremy McDermott, was among experts featured in an El País podcast on the progress of Colombia’s nascent peace process.

THE ORGANIZATION

InSight Crime Interviewed by Associated Press

3 FEB 2023

This week, InSight Crime’s Co-director Jeremy McDermott was interviewed by the Associated Press on developments in Haiti as the country continues its prolonged collapse. McDermott’s words were republished around the world,…

THE ORGANIZATION

Escaping Barrio 18

27 JAN 2023

Last week, InSight Crime published an investigation charting the story of Desafío, a 28-year-old Barrio 18 gang member who is desperate to escape gang life. But there’s one problem: he’s…