Port security essential in the fight against drug trafficking

The role of port security in the fight against corruption and drug trafficking is fundamental, and in Europe the ports of Antwerp, Hamburg and Rotterdam play a particularly important role in tackling transnational drug trafficking.

However, the fight against transnational drug trafficking is a shared responsibility that requires a coherent, comprehensive and coordinated response not only from governments, customs and security forces, but also from civil society and industry on both sides of the Atlantic. For this reason, cooperation between the various institutions involved and the different countries is important.

As part of the European project to combat drugs and organised crime in Peru, it has organised an internship at the ports of Rotterdam and Hamburg, where a delegation of Peruvian specialists has had the opportunity to examine the practices, cooperation mechanisms and strategies implemented by customs, police and judicial authorities and private actors in the fight against corruption and drug trafficking via shipping containers.

The experience observed in Rotterdam and Hamburg (a model that can be largely replicated in other European Union ports) shows that cooperation, understood as information exchange, coordination and mutual assistance, is a tangible reality that goes beyond the provisions of texts or agreements and can exist without the need for a specific regulatory framework: it is a fully operational everyday practice.

Beyond port operators, it is also essential to seek alliances with large companies that export Peruvian products, especially in the agricultural and mining sectors.

Precisely, aspects such as inter-institutional cooperation and coordination are essential to improve port security and are more feasible to implement in the short term in Peru. But to do so, it is necessary to first build trust. And we can say that this internship has had an additional benefit, which has been the cohesion generated during these days among the Peruvian actors (judges, prosecutors, customs officials, police), allowing for the building of trust and the projection of closer future cooperation.