World News for Students of English

12-05-2015 07:00

Berlin police have seized 380 kilograms of cocaine concealed in a shipment of bananas – the largest ever drug find in the German capital. Employees at a discount supermarket contacted police saying they had found what appeared to be drugs in some crates of bananas.

Concealed beneath the fruit, drug investigation officers discovered around 12 green packets per crate, each containing a kilogram of cocaine. The drug-filled crates were found in 10 discount branches in the capital and could be traced back to one central fruit market. But police said that they had not yet ascertained where they had come from.

“These 380 kilograms of cocaine you see behind me in these black packages are worth around 15 million euros. This cocaine has a purity of around 80% and is therefore of very high quality. It’d not be sold on the streets in this shape, rather it would be stretched.”

The find echoes an instant in January 2014 when boxes filled with bananas and 140 kilograms of cocaine were delivered to five Berlin supermarkets in what police called a logistical error by drug smugglers.

Difficult words: seize (to take), concealed (hidden), crate (a box), trace back (to find where something came from), ascertain (to find out for certain), purity (being pure – clean), stretch (to mix with other things), echo (to remind), instant (a situation), logistical (relating to logistics – the organisation of something).

Source: www.ondemandnews.com