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US authorities seized about 18.5 tonnes of cocaine with a market value of $ 500 million in the eastern Pacific Ocean, the US Coast Guard said Friday.
Cocaine was kidnapped Thursday from the Coast Guard ship James Port Everglades in Fort Lauderdale after being confiscated from 15 drug smugglers in international waters, the Coast Guard said.
Several cutters from the US Coast Guard have helped seize drugs from Mexico, Central America and South America, he added.
Some 49 suspects have also been arrested and will be prosecuted in South Florida, the Miami Herald reported.
Cocaine remains one of the most popular illegal drugs in the United States, where most of the cocaine is consumed in the world, according to federal officials.
"The first worrying signs indicate that cocaine use and availability are on the rise in the US for the first time in nearly a decade," said the US State Department in a report on the trade in narcotics in 2017.
Potential global cocaine production reached 1,410 tons in 2016, the highest level ever estimated, the UN said in a report on drugs and crime published in 2018.
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