Biggest Dutch cocaine lab busted
The Hague (Netherlands): Dutch police have dismantled what they describe as the biggest cocaine laboratory ever discovered in the Netherlands hidden at a former horse riding school and arrested a total of 17 people from Colombia, Turkey and the Netherlands.
Police said in a statement on Tuesday that they discovered tens of thousands of liters of chemicals and 100 kilograms (220 pounds) of crack cocaine when they raided the riding school on Friday.
They also found sleeping quarters for staff in the building in Nijeveen, 120 kilometers (75 miles) northeast of Amsterdam. (AP)
Egypt reopens Rafah crossing
Cairo: For the first time in five months amid the COVID-19 pandemic, Egypt on Tuesday reopened the Rafah border crossing with the Gaza Strip for three days to allow hundreds of stranded Palestinian to return to their homeland.
Egypt had completely closed the border crossing point in mid-March as part of the tight precautionary measures to prevent the spread of the novel coronavirus, reports Xinhua news agency.
The Hamas-run Ministries of Interior and Health said that all those who wil cross through Rafah crossing point to Gaza should go to quarantine centres outside the populated areas of the coastal enclave for 21 days over the COVID-19 concerns. (IANS)
19 inmates, guards killed in prison riot
Nairobi: A Somali police officer says at least 19 people were killed during a riot in the central prison in Somalia’s capital on Monday evening.
Abdiqani Mohamed Qalaf, spokesman for the police force in charge of prisons, told reporters the dead included 15 inmates and four guards. He said the situation is back to normal, but he gave no details.
Gen. Mahad Abdirahman, commander of the custodial corps, told reporters that the violence started when an inmate grabbed an officer’s gun and went on a shooting spree. (AP)
