Turkey has become a market for cocaine, as well as a transit route to Europe for the illicit drug, according to the 2022 report by the country’s narcotics police directorate. Meanwhile, there has been a significant spike in cocaine confiscated in Turkey, but not a proportionate spike in persons facing drug charges, daily BirGün reported. The report shows cocaine travelling from Colombia, Peru and Bolivia to Turkey, from where it is distributed throughout Europe and southeast Asia. The biggest cocaine busts were carried out in Turkey’s southern Mersin port, it said. In 2021, 4,714 people were taken into custody in 2,961 cocaine related incidents where 2,841 kg of cocaine was confiscated by police, the highest amount in Turkey to date, according to the report. The amount of cocaine confiscated in 2021 was 44.9 percent higher than the previous year, while rate of incidents rose by a disproportionately low 15 percent, and rate of persons accused of cocaine related crime rose by 6 percent. Figures suggest that Turkey is a significant corridor for cocaine and plays the role of illicit commerce, the report said, while actual use of cocaine or the stimulant’s domestic sales were low. In 2020, a total of 214.6 tons of cocaine were confiscated in the European Union, Norway and Turkey. The busts in Belgium, the Netherlands and Spain made up 73 percent of the whole, while smaller amounts of cocaine were also discovered in Greece, Bulgaria and Poland, suggesting that EU entry routes for the stimulant have diversified.
Ahval