Antwerp seizes less cocaine. Where did it go?

The figures

• The trend: Antwerp seized 116 tonnes of cocaine in 2023, 44 in 2024 and about 55 in 2025.
• First half of 2026: 5.4 tonnes in 28 seizures, against 16.7 tonnes in 82 seizures a year earlier. According to customs, Antwerp has lost its place as Europe’s number-one cocaine port — because of stricter controls, enforcement in origin and transit countries, and shifting routes.
• Elsewhere: over the same period, Dutch customs seized 20% more — 19.3 tonnes, mostly via Rotterdam. Spain seized around 30 tonnes.
• September in Antwerp: 120 kg in fruit containers from Costa Rica and Peru; a day later, 117 kg in sports bags inside a chemical cargo from Chile; two days after that, 2,390 kg under bananas. And a container of “liquid soap” from Colombia turned out to contain liquefied cocaine — flagged by the judicial police, confirmed by inspectors who noticed a chemical smell.

How it gets out of the port

The main method is still the rip-off: cocaine hidden in a legitimate container and taken out before anyone checks it. That depends on insiders.

• Stolen PIN codes. Europol estimated that at least 200 tonnes moved through Antwerp, Rotterdam and Hamburg/Bremerhaven this way, through networks of corrupt insiders. Antwerp has since replaced PIN codes with Certified Pick-up; since May 2024 they no longer work.
• Smugglers adapt. Loads are split into smaller batches, goods are transferred at sea or dropped overboard, and extractors — often young — hide on terminals to take the goods out.
• Arrests. In 2025 the maritime police made 207 drug-related arrests in the port. 191 of them were extractors; 41 were minors.

It doesn’t stay in the port

• Brussels: 170 shootings since the start of 2025. The prosecutor links them to drug-trafficking groups.
• The Netherlands: in early September in Overasselt, a violent incident in which a security guard was killed and two officers were seriously injured was followed by a threat video demanding the return of a missing drug shipment.

The clues exist — in different places

The Stroomplan already puts police, prosecutor, social inspection and customs under one roof — the need is recognised. But each party still works in its own systems, and legally they cannot simply pool everything.

With one shared picture

• Every party keeps its own systems. The shared picture runs in an environment the parties control, takes from each system only what the picture needs, and shows each party only the layers it is cleared for.
• Clues become one case. A flagged container, an unusual badge and a truck at the wrong gate become one case — while the container is still on the quay.

From clue to perpetrator

1. 01

   The extractor on the terminal

   Cameras and drones along the container stacks detect people where nobody should be at night. The nearest patrol is sent with the location and live images — before the goods leave the terminal.

2. 02

   The insider

   A badge used at a terminal where its holder has no shift, near a container customs has flagged, at the moment a pick-up is requested: separately three log lines, together one alert. Access to this kind of analysis is purpose-bound, and every query is logged.

3. 03

   The network

   Seizures are handled one case at a time. Laid over each other — routes, cargo types, carriers, timing — they show patterns no single seizure reveals. And because the flow moves, with Antwerp down and Rotterdam up, the picture has to cover terminals, ports and, where the law allows, borders.

4. 04

   Evidence that holds

   Sky ECC showed how far evidence based on data can go: 1,206 people convicted in five years, among them corrupt port workers and truck drivers. Every query in Meridian is logged — who asked what, on which legal basis — so the analysis can stand up in court.

Fewer seizures in Antwerp is progress. It also means the trade is looking for new routes — and new people. Finding those faster comes down to connecting what the port, customs and police already know.