Chilean authorities dismantled this Monday the largest drug trafficking operation recorded in the country’s history by intercepting more than 100 tons of cocaine hydrochloride and ketamine hidden through chemical impregnation in 1,080 tons of wood from Bolivia. The seizure simultaneously affected the ports of Arica, Valparaíso, and San Antonio, the main exit nodes for goods in the Chilean Pacific, and involved 45 containers with sawn timber and decking-type material that contained between 10% and 20% of illicit substances in their composition.
The regional prosecutor of Arica and Parinacota, Mario Carrera, described the method as sophisticated: the drugs—cocaine base, cocaine hydrochloride, ketamine, and adulterating agents such as caffeine, ecgonine methyl ester, and phenacetin—were incorporated into the structure of the wood, invisible to the naked eye and detectable only through laboratory analysis. “This is 100% intelligence work and investigative work.”
“No finding was accidental,” declared Carrera. The technical verification was carried out by the Public Health Institute, with the support of canine units and specialized scanner technology. The shipments were destined for at least fifteen countries in Europe, North America, and Oceania, using Chile as a platform for export under the guise of legal forestry trade.
The operation is part of the strategy called Port Focus, implemented by the Prosecutor’s Office in 2024 to strengthen controls against transnational organized crime. The National Prosecutor, Ángel Valencia, highlighted the value of the collective effort between the Regional Prosecutor’s Office of Arica and Parinacota, the maritime police, and the National Customs Directorate. The Minister of Public Security, Martín Arrau, described the procedure as a milestone and warned that organized crime “does not respect borders, is more agile, and is better funded”. The investigation had repercussions in Bolivia: Prosecutor Carrera confirmed that the Bolivian Prosecutor’s Office made arrests based on the information shared by Chile within the framework of existing judicial cooperation agreements.
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The Chilean Maritime Police and its canine unit inspect the multi-million dollar shipment of 68 tons of drugs from Bolivia seized in March 2026
The magnitude of the seizure gains significance when placed in context. Until a few years ago, Chile was considered primarily a transit country, not a relevant export hub. That perception began to change with warnings from the DEA in 2018 and deepened with a report from the UN International Narcotics Control Board that placed Chile alongside Colombia and Brazil as a verifiable origin of cocaine hydrochloride shipped by sea to Europe. The trend accelerated from 2023, when the United Nations identified Chilean ports as an active passageway for organized crime. By March 2026, a shipment of about 68 tons of cocaine impregnated in Bolivian wood had already been intercepted.
Authorities estimated that the seized shipments would have generated illicit profits exceeding 8.334 billion dollars in the European market, equivalent to some 584 million potential doses. The figure illustrates the financial dimension of the business that the cartels attempted to sustain under the guise of the timber trade: a scheme that required six months of accumulated intelligence to dismantle and which, due to its scale and technical sophistication, raises questions about the capacity of South Pacific ports to detect concealment methods that are only visible in the laboratory.
