Bolivarian National Police officers apprehended one person in Maracaibo, Zulia, during a citizen-security operation against the sale and distribution of drugs.[1] The suspect allegedly used gas cylinders as camouflage to evade police checkpoints and controls.[1] Police intercepted the cargo truck near Paseo Las Ciencias in the Casco Central of Bolívar parish in Maracaibo after prior alerts and intelligence work on its suspicious movements.[2]

Officers seized 600 wraps of marijuana weighing 315 kilograms that had been hidden inside domestic gas cylinders in central Maracaibo.[2] The final inventory listed 315 kilograms of marijuana in 600 packs, 30 modified domestic gas cylinders, one cargo truck and one mobile phone.[2] The suspect allegedly used a basic-services distribution front to move the load by truck, drilling and altering cylinders to create false bottoms that concealed the drug on public roads.[2]

Venezuelan reports call gas cylinders bombonas, the local term for domestic cooking-gas containers, and say the Interior Ministry announced the arrest through its official Telegram channel.[2] The detainee, whose identity was not revealed, was placed immediately at the disposal of the Public Ministry Prosecutor’s Office for criminal proceedings.[2] Authorities described the procedure as part of the National Anti-Drug Plan under the instructions of Interior Minister Diosdado Cabello Rondón.[2]

An English-language edition of the same account states that officers of the Bolivarian National Police Corps seized 600 packages of marijuana weighing 315 kilograms in the centre of Maracaibo.[3]