Dutch seize $54 mn of heroin in salt container

Dutch police seized its largest-ever haul of heroin after searching a shipping container filled with Himalayan salt from Pakistan, prosecutors said Tuesday, following close collaboration with UK law enforcement.

Law officials also arrested five men earlier this month in connection with the 1.5-tonne seizure at Rotterdam port said to have a street value of 45 million euros ($54.6 million).

“It’s the largest seizure ever of heroin in the country,” the Dutch public prosecutor’s office said in a statement.

The seizure and arrests came after “intensive cooperation with the British-based National Crime Agency,” it added.

Three of the five men, aged 33, 37 and 38 were still in custody while two others, aged 60 and 62 have been released “but remain suspects”, prosecutors said.

Law officers did not give any other information, except to say the investigation was still ongoing.

The drugs have already been destroyed.

Rotterdam’s massive harbour, the largest in Europe, is a major entry point for cocaine and heroin into the continent.

In a previous haul in 2014, police found three-quarters of a tonne of heroin stashed in a raisin-filled container from Iran.