As Minister of Foreign Affairs, Hans van Mierlo prevented Desi Bouterse from being arrested in 1997. The Surinamese army chief was suspected of drug trafficking. The then minister of justice Winnie Sorgdrager wanted to have him arrested in Brazil, but Van Mierlo prevented that. Sorgdrager reveals that to NRC.
Desi Bouterse was convicted in absentia in the Netherlands in 1999 for cocaine smuggling. He was sentenced to 16 years in prison and a fine of 4.6 million guilders, the highest penalty imposed in a drug case at the time.
Investigative services had been targeting him for years. In 1986 Bouterse was the main target of an undercover operation in Miami, where he tried to set up a drug line to Paramaribo. He escaped because he didn’t show up at the last minute.
Signaled
In the Netherlands, there was also a criminal investigation into Bouterse’s involvement in large-scale cocaine trafficking for years. In 1997 the then Surinamese army chief was spotted in Brazil. Winnie Sorgdrager (D66), then Minister of Justice, wanted to ask the South American country to arrest Bouterse.
In return for NRC Sorgdrager now says that she was opposed by Van Mierlo, then party leader and Minister of Foreign Affairs. Van Mierlo did not want Bouterse arrested because of the relationship with Suriname and because he was ‘in love’ with the country, says Sorgdrager.
When the newspaper brought this out at the time, Van Mierlo denied the real reason. He said he did not ask for Bouterse’s arrest because he had information that Brazil would not cooperate with the request. Sorgdrager now says she was ‘angry’ about the intervention of Van Mierlo, who died in 2010. Her law enforcement officers were ‘frustrated’.
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