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Cocaine might have come from Taiwan

Cocaine might have come from Taiwan

By Niño N. Luces

SEIZED COCAINE — Chief Superintendent Antonio Gardiola Jr., Police Regional Office 5 (PRO5) director, leads the presentation to media of the seized packs of cocaine placed in a container that drifted ashore in Sorsogon during a press briefing yesterday at Camp General Simeol Ola, Legazpi City, Albay. With him are (from left) Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA)-Bicol Director Christian O. Frivaldo, Senior Supt. Solomon Segundo, chief of the Philippine National Police Crime Laboratory Office 5, and a personnel from regional crime lab. (Niño N. Luces)

SEIZED COCAINE — Chief Superintendent Antonio Gardiola Jr., Police Regional Office 5 (PRO5) director, leads the presentation to media of the seized packs of cocaine placed in a container that drifted ashore in Sorsogon during a press briefing yesterday at Camp General Simeol Ola, Legazpi City, Albay. With him are (from left) Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA)-Bicol Director Christian O. Frivaldo, Senior Supt. Solomon Segundo, chief of the Philippine National Police Crime Laboratory Office 5, and a personnel from regional crime lab. (Niño N. Luces) Camp Ola, Albay — There is a possibility that the P120 million worth of cocaine packed into a container that drifted to shore in Sorsogon last Wednesday had come from a Taiwan-registered vessel that made an emergency docking in Northern Samar last January 2. This is one of the theories floated by the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA)-Bicol and the Police Regional Office 5 (PRO5) when officials presented to media in this camp yesterday the contraband plucked from Juag Lagoon, Barangay Calintaan, Matnog town, Sorsogon. Chief Superintendent Antonio Gardiola Jr., PRO5 director, said that based on their investigation, the Taiwanese vessel “Jing Ming 16” made a distress call to the Philippine Coast Guard (PCG) as it began to sink off Pambujan, Northern Samar at the height of the onslaught of tropical depression “Agaton.”

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