The ear­ly morn­ing in­ter­cep­tion of a boat led to the seizure of a quan­ti­ty of mar­i­jua­na and the ar­rest of three Venezue­lans, ac­cord­ing to the Min­istry of De­fence yes­ter­day.

In a me­dia re­lease, the min­istry re­port­ed that at around 1.48 am, the In­ter­cep­tor 030 stopped a lo­cal ves­sel, TFV 1231 Cham­pi­on, about 10.8 nau­ti­cal miles south­west of Bar­rac­n­ness Point.

Of­fi­cers searched the ves­sel and found 11 cro­cus bags con­tain­ing the drugs.

The ves­sel and pas­sen­gers were tak­en to Staubles Bay, Ch­aguara­mas.

The op­er­a­tion in­volved the Strate­gic In­tel­li­gence Unit, the Im­mi­gra­tion Di­vi­sion and the Cus­toms and Ex­cise Di­vi­sion.

“Our mar­itime do­main re­mains un­der ac­tive watch. The Trinidad and To­ba­go De­fence Force will con­tin­ue to de­tect, in­ter­cept and dis­rupt mar­itime threats, us­ing every law­ful ca­pa­bil­i­ty avail­able to pro­tect Trinidad and To­ba­go and its ter­ri­to­r­i­al wa­ters,” the De­fence Min­istry said.