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Hand Over Vehicles to Embassy, Insurance Company
- Safiu Kehinde
In what was described as a major breakthrough in the fight against transnational organized crime, the Nigeria Police Force has recovered two high-end vehicles stolen from the Netherlands and illegally shipped into Nigeria.
This was disclosed in a statement issued on Monday by the Force Public Relations Officer, Benjamin Hundeyin.
According to the statement, operatives of the INTERPOL National Central Bureau (NCB), Abuja had in a collaboration with INTERPOL NCB The Hague, traced and recovered the vehicles, a Toyota C-HR (2020 model) and a Toyota RAV4 (2019 model), from separate locations in Lagos and Akwa Ibom States.
Investigations revealed that the vehicles were stolen from Amsterdam and Midden-Nederland and subsequently shipped to Nigeria through the Port of Antwerp, Belgium, arriving Apapa, Lagos, in late 2023.
In the wake of the recovery, the Nigeria Police Force, through INTERPOL NCB Abuja, instituted civil forfeiture proceedings at the Federal High Court, Abuja.
The Court, upon conclusion of due legal process, granted a final forfeiture order in favour of the Government of the Netherlands through the vehicles’ insurance company, thereby facilitating their lawful repatriation.
This enabled the Nigeria Police Force INTERPOL to formally hand over the recovered vehicles to representatives of the insurance company and the Embassy of the Kingdom of the Netherlands in Nigeria on Monday, marking the successful conclusion of the cross-border recovery and restitution effort.
In his remark, the Inspector-General of Police, Kayode Egbetokun, commended the operatives of INTERPOL NCB Abuja for their professionalism and the effective synergy with international partners, particularly INTERPOL NCB The Hague.
He noted that the successful recovery and repatriation of the vehicles reflect the Force’s firm commitment to global law enforcement cooperation and to ensuring that criminal networks involved in cross-border vehicle theft and smuggling are denied the proceeds of their crimes.