The Unit­ed States Coast Guard on Tues­day said the crew of Coast Guard Cut­ter For­ward of­floaded in Port Ever­glades, Flori­da more than 7,302 pounds of co­caine, with an as­sessed street val­ue of about US$96 mil­lion, in­ter­dict­ed in the Caribbean Sea.

The US Coast Guard said its crews, work­ing along­side in­ter­a­gency and in­ter­na­tion­al part­ners, in­ter­dict­ed the il­le­gal drugs dur­ing three sep­a­rate cas­es.

“This was an­oth­er vi­tal suc­cess of our com­bined drug in­ter­dic­tion ef­forts,” Lieu­tenant Com­man­der Juan Ramirez, a Coast Guard Dis­trict Sev­en staff at­tor­ney.

“These drug of­floads un­der­score our con­tin­ued part­ner­ships with the US Navy and the Roy­al Nether­lands Navy in com­bat­ing the flow of il­lic­it nar­cotics across the Caribbean.

“The suc­cess of our joint ef­forts to save lives by re­duc­ing the avail­abil­i­ty of these harm­ful drugs is de­pen­dent on our co­op­er­a­tion with re­gion­al and in­ter­na­tion­al part­ners,” he added.

The US Coast Guard said three sus­pect­ed smug­glers will face pros­e­cu­tion in US fed­er­al courts by the De­part­ment of Jus­tice.

“De­tect­ing and in­ter­dict­ing il­le­gal drug traf­fick­ers on the high seas in­volves sig­nif­i­cant in­ter­a­gency and in­ter­na­tion­al co­or­di­na­tion,” said the US Coast Guard, adding that the Joint In­ter­a­gency Task Force South in Key West, Flori­da con­ducts the de­tec­tion and mon­i­tor­ing of aer­i­al and mar­itime tran­sit of il­le­gal drugs.

“Once in­ter­dic­tion be­comes im­mi­nent, the law en­force­ment phase of the op­er­a­tion be­gins, and con­trol of the op­er­a­tion shifts to the US Coast Guard through­out the in­ter­dic­tion and ap­pre­hen­sion,” the US Coast Guard con­tin­ued.

It said in­ter­dic­tions in the Caribbean Sea are per­formed by mem­bers of the US Coast Guard un­der the au­thor­i­ty and con­trol of the Coast Guard’s Sev­enth Dis­trict, head­quar­tered in Mi­a­mi.  —MI­A­MI (CMC)