A week before Valentine’s Day, a consignment of cocaine was found hidden among 20,000 roses from Colombia at Amsterdam airport, Dutch authorities said Wednesday.
The roses, a popular February 14 Valentine’s Day gift, arrived last Sunday on a flight from Bogota which stopped over in Puerto Rico, the public prosecutors’ office said in a statement. The drug was found in cellophane packets hidden in boxes containing the roses.
Three people in the Netherlands were arrested and police found a total of 9 kg (20 lb) of cocaine in their possession, including the seized shipment, with a street value of about €1.3 million (1.14 million).
The Netherlands is a major flower trading hub, home to the world’s biggest flower auction house and is the source of 60% of the world’s flower exports. Colombia is the world’s second largest flower exporter and the world’s largest producer of cocaine.
