World

The millions of containers unloaded by Rotterdam’s giant cranes make it Europe’s largest port, but the Dutch city is also dealing with ever larger amounts of a less welcome cargo: cocaine.

A record of nearly 70 tonnes of the drug was intercepted in 2021, up 74 percent from a year before, said Ger Scheringa, who leads a team of armed customs officers at the port.

Rotterdam and Antwerp in neighbouring Belgium were the two main entry points used by a Dubai-based “super cartel” supplying a third of Europe’s cocaine, which Europol said it busted last month.

The cocaine is usually hidden in containers, or sometimes underneath ships in openings below the water line where they are then recovered by divers.

Pinpointing the reason for this jump in cocaine seizures is a “delicate question”, Scheringa told AFP. 

“It seems there are lots of buyers” in Europe, he said dryly.

“And if there is demand, it is supplied.”

Rotterdam has taken major steps to stop the white powder making its way into Europe, particularly by stepping up customs checks, the Dutchman said.

But he doesn’t expect Rotterdam’s record for seizures to be beaten in 2022, and admitted that he “doesn’t know if there is really a solution to the problem” as long as people keep taking cocaine.

– ‘Needle in a haystack’ –

Rotterdam mayor Ahmed Aboutaleb has deplored the fact that the port city is “drowning in cocaine”, and condemns the violence that accompanies the drug trade.

Aboutaleb wants port authorities to scan all containers arriving from Latin America.

But customs official Scheringa said the “biggest challenge is to find a good balance between the speed of logistics for the port, and checking everything you want.”

Gangs use sophisticated methods to send the cocaine through Rotterdam and then recover it afterwards, often relying on inside information, said Romilda Schaaf, a drugs specialist for the port police.

Maps on her computer show the dizzying scale of her patch, with tens of thousands of containers piling up at multiple terminals, meaning investigators need precise details to find smuggled drugs.

“It really is a question of finding a needle in a haystack,” she told AFP.

Young men, often from the deprived south of Rotterdam according to prosecutors, sometimes spend several nights in “container hotels” equipped with food and blankets, close to where a container with cocaine is expected.

They then move the drugs to different containers so there is less chance of them being checked, particularly if they come from South America.

More than 70 people have been arrested so far this year for trafficking-related offences in the port, said Scheringa, including gang members and even port employees.

As recently as December 6, Dutch police said a 43-year-old female officer from Rotterdam was arrested over allegations of corruption and involvement in drug trafficking.

Gangs pay dockers and officials up to 100,000 euros to help get big batches through, Scheringa said.

It’s easy money, said police official Schaaf, “but it leads to nothing. If you say yes once, you can’t say no… (so) don’t start in the first place!”

– Assassinations  –

Dutch customs officers insist that good contacts with “source” countries are important to stem the flood of cocaine, along with tackling efforts to corrupt port employees — and more checks.

A key part of the checks is risk assessment. Containers are singled out as suspect, often because of information from abroad, then scanned, unpacked and searched with sniffer dogs. 

Some ships are also inspected by diving teams.

The automation of some parts of the port, and therefore the elimination of the human factor, has also helped to curb corruption, according to two officials.

Violence linked to the cocaine trade has deeply touched Dutch society.

A famous Dutch journalist and a lawyer who were involved in the trial of an alleged drug lord were assassinated in 2019 and 2021, shocking the country and convincing authorities to allocate more resources to a crackdown.

“The aim is really to assure people that they can live in safety, and that no politician, lawyer or crime reporter should have to be under protection because this junk is coming into our country,” said Schaaf. 

A French court will issue verdicts Tuesday for eight suspects charged in the harrowing 2016 terror attack in Nice, where an allegedly radicalised Islamist attacker is accused of ploughing his truck into a crowd celebrating the July 14 national holiday.

Mohamed Lahouaiej-Bouhlel, a 31-year-old Tunisian resident, killed 86 people and injured over 450 after speeding onto a seaside embankment in the southern city, rampaging for four minutes before being shot dead by police.

Prosecutors are seeking 15-year prison terms against three suspects on charges of association with terrorists.

Ramzi Arefa, who has admitted to providing Lahouaiej-Bouhlel with a gun that he fired at police without hitting anyone, faces charges relating to supplying the weapon.

He is not thought to have been aware of the attacker’s radicalisation.

“I’m guilty of selling a weapon, without thinking about it, and since then it’s been six years that I haven’t stopped thinking about it,” Arefa told the court in his closing statement Monday.

But two others, Mohamed Ghraieb and Chokri Chafroud, allegedly knew about the attacker’s turn to Islamist radicalism and his potential to carry out a terror attack, based on records of phone calls and text messages among the three in the days ahead of the massacre. 

Ghraieb, a 47-year-old from the same Tunisian town as Lahouaiej-Bouhlel, and Chafroud are also accused of helping him rent the delivery truck. They have denied the charges.

“I am not a terrorist, I had nothing to do with what happened,” Ghraieb said Monday, while Chafroud, 43 and also Tunisian, declined to address the court.

Prosecutor Jean-Michel Bourles had argued however that “there can be no doubt: They acted in full awareness of his discourse and his fascination, his proximity with the Islamic State.”

The Islamic State group later claimed Lahouaiej-Bouhlel as one of its followers, though investigators have not found any links between the attacker and the jihadists who at the time controlled swathes of Iraq and Syria.

– Night of horror –

Five other suspects, a Tunisian and four Albanians, are charged with weapons trafficking and criminal conspiracy but without any terrorism link.

But Brahim Tritrou is being tried in absentia after fleeing judicial supervision to Tunisia, where he is now believed to be under arrest.

Some 30,000 people had gathered on the Nice seafront to watch a fireworks display celebrating France’s annual Bastille Day holiday on July 14 when Lahouaiej-Bouhlel began his rampage.

According to French and Tunisian press reports, his body was repatriated to Tunisia in 2017 and buried in his hometown of M’saken, south of Tunis. This has never been confirmed by the Tunisian authorities.

France has been buffeted by a wave of Islamist terror attacks since the killings at the satirical Charlie Hebdo newspaper and a Jewish supermarket in Paris in January 2015, often by “lone wolf” attackers acting in the name of IS or other jihadist groups.

In October, a Paris appeals court upheld the life sentence of Ali Riza Polat, accused of helping to find the weapons for the Charlie Hebdo attackers.

The Nice trial is taking place at the historic Palais de Justice in Paris, in the same purpose-built courtroom that hosted the hearings over the November 2015 terror attacks in Paris that left 130 people dead.

A special venue has also been set up in Nice to allow victims to follow proceedings via a live broadcast.

For many of the victims, the sentences sought by prosecutors fail to match the scope of the suffering.

During the trial, many of the survivors gasped in horror when prosecutors showed grisly video footage, never seen publicly, of the vehicle as Lahouaiej-Bouhlel swerved through the crowd, trying to mow down as many people as possible.

“I hope the court will be more severe than they’ve asked — I cannot understand them after all that’s been said in the hearings,” said Anne Murris, president of the Memorial des Anges victims’ association, who lost her daughter in the attack. 

France hosts an international conference Tuesday designed to raise material and money to repair Ukraine’s damaged infrastructure as well as underline Paris’ ongoing support for Kyiv’s fight against Russia.

The gathering of politicians, blue-chip companies and aid agencies comes after fresh comments about the war from French President Emmanuel Macron which put him at odds with many in Ukraine.

Macron called for Russia to be offered “security guarantees” at the end of the war during an interview on December 3, drawing criticism from some Ukrainian and eastern European politicians.

A call between the French leader and Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelensky on Sunday cleared the air and saw the men discuss Tuesday’s conference.

Macron “reminded President Zelensky that Ukraine can count on France’s support for as long as is required to fully re-establish its sovereignty and national integrity,” according to the French presidency.

Both men will address the first part of the conference, called “Solidarity with the Ukrainian People” — Macron in person and Zelensky via videolink.

The event will focus on ways in which Ukraine’s Western allies can provide immediate support to keep the country’s civil infrastructure functioning amid incessant bombing from Russia.

Moscow has switched tactics since October when it began airstrikes targeting Ukraine’s energy network in particular, plunging millions into cold and darkness at the onset of winter.

Another 1.5 million people were left without power in southern Odessa over the weekend after drone attacks, according to Ukrainian authorities. 

“Our immediate objective is to ensure that Ukraine’s network does not collapse and lead to black-outs for several weeks,” an aide to Macron told journalists last Friday. “This is about urgent help.”

– Coordination – 

French organisers have stressed that the conference is different from other recent international gatherings in Lugano, Warsaw or Berlin dedicated to long-term reconstruction.

Instead, they hope donors will pledge help from engineering expertise to spare parts to carry out repairs. 

Another key outcome will be a new platform, agreed by G7 leaders Monday, that will enable donors to see Ukraine’s needs and coordinate their aid.

Western military aid is currently coordinated in this way, but nothing of the sort exists for civilian assistance, Macron’s office said.

“The goal is now to build this platform quickly with the participation of Ukraine, international financial institutions and other partners,” German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said after the leaders of the club of wealthy nations held online talks Monday.

Ukraine’s Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal and Zelensky’s wife Olena are both expected to be in Paris.

The second part of the event, called “The Franco-Ukrainian conference for Resilience and Reconstruction”, will see 500 French companies gather to discuss reconstruction contracts.

Even though the war is still raging, Western states and companies are already eyeing deals that are expected to be worth tens of billions of euros. 

“The Ukrainians wanted us to talk about reconstruction. There are already areas that have been evacuated by the Russian army which are ready to discuss reconstruction,” the French official said. 

The French economy ministry had already prepared a range of tools to encourage its companies, from insurance to export guarantees. 

– Out of context? –

Macron’s comments about providing security guarantees to Russia led to accusations he was focusing again on diplomatic compromises with Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Critics say it is too early to discuss arrangements with Putin and that Western leaders should focus uniquely on helping Ukraine roll back Russia’s occupation.

Macron has riled his Ukrainian allies in the past, most notably in June when he said “we must not humiliate Russia”.

The 44-year-old French leader initially tried to position himself as an intermediary between Ukraine and Russia, holding lengthy talks with Putin and Zelensky shortly before Moscow’s attack.

Macron’s office have played down any suggestion of tensions with Zelensky.

“There’s a gap between what some people say by taking part of a sentence out of context and the reality of the work that we are doing, which is going smoothly,” the aide said.

“The dialogue between the president (Macron) and President Zelensky is excellent.”

From Super Mario to Final Fantasy, Japan has long been synonymous with gaming, but some experts and parents fear a growing addiction problem is going unaddressed.

While nearby nations like China and South Korea have imposed drastic restrictions on youth gaming in recent years — with mixed results — some Japanese families feel they are being left to deal with the issue on their own.

Each month, a group meets in Tokyo to swap stories and strategies for tackling their children’s gaming habits.

“My only comfort is that he has been keeping his promise to stay offline overnight,” one father says, as another confides their child has been attending a rehab day camp.

The group’s founder, Sakiko Kuroda, says children in Japan now start playing video games early in primary school, and pandemic restrictions mean many are playing for longer.

Many parents do not know how to deal with the issue, and there is “a lack of action by the government and the gaming industry,” said Kuroda, who started the group in 2019 as an informal meet-up.

“People come from across the country to take part, as this kind of self-help gathering is rare in Japan.”

The World Health Organization describes “gaming disorder” as behaviour that results in “significant impairment” of areas like relationships, education or work, and lasts at least a year.

As gaming can overlap with other online activities like social media use, it is hard to quantify the problem, though anecdotal evidence from doctors suggests more families in Japan are worried — particularly since the pandemic.

– ‘Playing all night’ –

An education ministry survey this April showed that 17 percent of children aged six to 12 spend more than four hours a day gaming — up from nine percent in 2017, with a similar jump seen among those aged 12 to 15.

“Games have clever systems to lure people into continuing to play… including constantly updated apps and virtual money,” said Mia Itoshiro, who works with a group that gives seminars on preventing gaming addiction.

“Parents are increasingly consulting us saying ‘my children can’t go to school because they’re tired after playing all night’.”

China in November announced it had “solved” youth gaming addiction by limiting the time children can play online games to just three specified hours a week, enforced through facial recognition software and ID registration.

Meanwhile, South Korea last year removed a decade-long ban on PC-based online gaming for children under 16 between midnight and 6:00 am, which local media had branded outdated and ineffective.

Japan has had no similar rules, and even a much-debated 2020 local ordinance that banned under-18s from playing more than an hour on weekdays had no enforcement mechanism.

Parents and experts say gaming can tip into obsessive behaviour in children because of other problems, including Covid-related stress or bullying.

The mother of a 13-year-old girl told AFP that video games became a “lifeline” for her daughter when she was struggling at school.

When she tried to take away the girl’s tablet, her daughter, then 10, replied: “If you deprive me of this, I’d want to die.”

“I was shocked to hear her say something like that,” the mother said.

Others who have experienced gaming addiction also say it became a lifeline for them during times of struggle.

– Underlying problems –

Takahisa Masuda, now a 46-year-old social worker, plunged into gaming as a bullied middle school student, and he believes the escape mechanism saved his life.

“I had thought about killing myself, but I wanted to finish Dragon Quest,” Masuda told AFP.

By the time he had, he felt strong enough to face his tormentors, and he committed to his studies, eventually realising his goal of working in the gaming industry.

So, while parents are often inclined to ban gaming or remove devices, Susumu Higuchi, a doctor and director of the Kurihama Medical and Addiction Centre, instead offers children counselling to tackle underlying problems.

His clinic also provides offline activities from art and cooking to sports, intended to open patients up to other hobbies and social situations.

He wants the government and industry to do more to prevent children from becoming addicted in the first place.

“Discussing gaming and online tools requires a balance,” Higuchi said.

“But at the moment it seems to me that measures to rein in the negative aspects are dwarfed by the promotion of gaming.”