Brazil seizes timber shipment in suspected record cocaine bust

Brazil seized eight trucks carrying about 260 metric tons of timber after intelligence pointed officers to a shipment that may have hidden cocaine inside the wood itself, a case authorities said could become the country’s biggest cocaine haul ever. Brazilian officials said preliminary forensic testing was positive for cocaine, and the operation involved U.S. and Bolivian agencies.

The Federal Revenue Service called the case Operation Timber Shield and said shared intelligence led to stepped-up border checks on June 19. Officers detained four trucks in Corumbá, in Mato Grosso do Sul, and four more in Cáceres, in Mato Grosso, with about 130 metric tons of wood at each site. Bolivia’s customs agency and the Fuerza Especial de Lucha Contra el Narcotráfico, or FELCN, were part of the coordinated effort.

Authorities said the same concealment method had recently appeared in Chile in a major seizure tied to the same source area in Bolivia. Based on earlier cases using the same tactic, the revenue service estimated that illicit material could account for 10% to 20% of the timber cargo’s weight, which would translate into roughly 20 to 50 metric tons of cocaine if Federal Police analysis confirms the finding. The tactic shows how traffickers are embedding narcotics in legitimate bulk cargo, not just hiding them in containers.

If confirmed, the seizure would dwarf Brazil’s best-known cocaine hauls. The country’s previous maritime record was 3.62 tons seized off Pernambuco in September 2023, and customs officers intercepted more than 1.5 tonnes at the Port of Santos on June 10. Recent analysis cited Brazilian Federal Police data as showing cocaine seizures at Brazilian ports fell to 15.6 tonnes in 2025 from a peak of 66.8 tonnes, a sign that traffickers are pushing deeper into supply-chain concealment as enforcement tightens.