Niger police seize more than 200kg of cocaine worth €7.6m from mayor's truck

The mayor and his driver, who were in the vehicle at the time, were arrested with 199 bricks of cocaine at a checkpoint on the road heading north out of the desert trading hub of Agadez on Sunday, the sources said.

A statement from Niger's Central Office for the Repression of Illicit Drug Trafficking (OCRTIS) confirmed that there had been a record seizure of more than 200kg of cocaine in Agadez, but did not give details.

West Africa, most often a transit route for illegal drugs on the way from South America to Europe, has registered a series of record busts in recent years.

Senegal seized more than two tonnes of pure cocaine from a ship off its Atlantic coast in October, and Gambian authorities seized nearly three tonnes last January from a shipment originating in Ecuador.

After 17 tonnes of cannabis resin worth around $37 million were seized in Niger last May, Interpol's drug unit coordinator Jan Drapal told Reuters that drug kingpins were sending larger shipments in response to increasing European demand.