Between one banana and the next, you could find a packet of cocaine in Switzerland this week
Zurich, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Emmenthal, Graubuenden, Thurgau: conservative Swiss cantons suddenly found themselves in the news Thursday evening 25 November as the accidental recipients of 100 kg of cocaine, with a street value of CHF1.5 million.
The coke, in small packets, was discovered in crates of bananas in several locations. Federal authorities say it was not meant to be delivered to the Swiss market, and they are investigating.
The woman who discovered 70 kg of cocaine in Bern, and who alerted police, was checking the weight of the crate of Colombian bananas.
Update 16 December Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Bananas have come close to being the fruit that broke the Doha Round’s back, but they could in the end save the talks, says the International Centre for Trade and Sustainable Development (ICTSD). The European Union (EU) and Latin American exporters initialed an agreement Tuesday 15 December at the World Trade Organization (WTO) in Geneva. It will settle their dispute over the banana trade and tariffs, which has been running for more than 10 years.
“An agreement on bananas is widely viewed as a critical condition for a conclusion to the stalled WTO Doha Round of trade negotiations,” says the Geneva-based ICTSD. The organization provides the international trade system with input on sustainable development aspects of trade.
A study published Tuesday by the ICTSD shows that “a new deal on European Union banana import tariffs will be a boon to Latin American exporters but would trigger a drop in exports of the fruit from African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) countries. But the blow to ACP banana exporters may be cushioned by the aid money that the EU has promised in conjunction with the deal.”
