Four drug traffickers, known as ‘uithalers’, were arrested on Wednesday morning in Rotterdam’s port while attempting to extract drugs from a shipping container.
Three of those arrested were Belgian nationals aged 14, 15, and 19. The fourth suspect is a 17-year-old boy from Landsmeer in North Holland. All four suspects were detained at a terminal in Maasvlakte by the customs officials and then handed over to the police.
Uithalers are typically employed by criminal organisations to extract drugs from shipping containers; the substance involved is almost always cocaine.
A specialised team comprised of members from customs, the Fiscal Information and Investigation Service (FOID), the Rotterdam police department, and the Public Prosecutor’s Office confiscated 46,789 kilograms of cocaine at the port of Rotterdam in 2022.
The total catch for 2023 has not yet been published.
According to a report by the Dutch Centre against Child Trafficking and Human Trafficking, more and more children as young as 10 or 12 are being exploited by criminal organisations in the Netherlands linked to the drug trade.
The rise pushed Dutch authorities in December to start investigating new ways to stop young people turning to crime.
