Prefectura Naval Argentina officers seized more than 37 kilograms of marijuana buds on the river bank at Itá Ibaté, in Corrientes province, Argentina.[1][2] The force valued the load at more than 143 million pesos, and said it had been brought in from Paraguay across the Paraná river.[1][2]

The operation followed an inquiry by the force’s Delegación de Inteligencia Criminal e Investigaciones, which established that drugs would be brought in on the stretch of the Paraná between kilometres 1370 and 1380.[1] Patrols spotted a motor boat with two people aboard that crossed from the Paraguayan bank and reached Puerto Chinita at kilometre 1370.[1] The two left four bundles among the vegetation and escaped back towards Paraguay; nobody was detained.[1]

A search of the riverside turned up the four packages wrapped in black nylon hidden in the undergrowth, and field tests confirmed they held marijuana buds ready for distribution.[1] The case file, the official weighing of the drug and the preservation of evidence were left with the Unidad Fiscal Federal de Corrientes, the federal prosecution unit in the province.[1]

The security ministry’s own account says the boat’s occupants threw the bundles overboard and returned quickly to Paraguay, and that the case is handled by the Unidad Fiscal Federal de Corrientes.[3]

Patrols set up surveillance on the stretch of the Paraná between kilometres 1370 and 1380 after intelligence indicated drugs would be brought in there.[2]