At first look, the environment of Oslo’s port on a sunny September afternoon appear to be one thing out of a postcard. Some courageous souls dive into the chilly North Sea after a sauna session; others glide at excessive pace on water skis whereas dodging dozens of kayaks. The terraces subsequent to the Edvard Munch Museum are filled with diners and seafood. From the roof of the imposing Opera House, a whole lot of vacationers gaze out on the panorama: an impressive fjord dotted with boats, a near-perfect picture marred solely by the port cranes, that are more and more unloading containers of cocaine beneath the watchful eye of Swedish prison gangs increasing into Norway.
“We are usually not ready to take care of this,” admits Karin Tandero Schaug, president of the Norwegian Customs union, alluding to what some native media have described as a “cocaine tsunami.” Tandero Schaug factors to the Covid pandemic because the turning level: “Between the top of 2021 and the start of 2022, we clearly noticed a rise. Among younger folks, among the many jet set, in varied social settings, cocaine use was turning into normalized at events.” The union chief asserts that warning indicators had been raised, however that it took greater than a yr for the political class to react.
Her colleague Rune Gundersen remembers that it was in March 2023 when the matter burst into the media, following the seizure of 820 kilos of cocaine in a container of bananas from South America. “We had by no means seen something like this. We had been used to intercepting small portions, largely for private use, however not kilos,” he says. The yr closed with 2.3 tons seized, greater than in your entire earlier decade.
Customs officers really feel overwhelmed: they lack enough sources and personnel to deal with the avalanche of cocaine. They solely have one scanner able to inspecting full containers in Oslo, which they have to share amongst a number of ports. After a interval of cutbacks, throughout which they had been on the verge of getting to get rid of a number of vessels, the customs service’s price range has been elevated in 2025, which has allowed for some reinforcement, amongst different issues, with the acquisition of one other scanner — “though it gained’t be operational for one more two years,” laments Gundersen. Despite the price range improve, Tandero Schaug emphasizes that many officers will retire within the coming years and that not sufficient younger individuals are being skilled to make sure generational renewal.
Oslo Mayor Anne Lindboe, a conservative, acknowledged just a few months in the past that the Norwegian capital’s port had change into “considered one of Europe’s favorites for organized crime” and admitted that present management and safety measures are inadequate.
Drugs, nonetheless, don’t simply enter by the port of Oslo in giant quantities. They additionally arrive through varied factors alongside the coast, by airports, or the greater than 1,600 kilometers of land border with Sweden, alongside the handfuls of roads that join the 2 international locations, “and even by snowmobile, on skis, or on foot,” says Tandero Schaug.
In an effort to curb cross-border prison exercise, a joint police station was inaugurated final week on the border between Norway and Sweden. The solemn ceremony was attended by Crown Princess Victoria of Sweden and Prince Haakon of Norway. It is the most recent step taken within the technique to strengthen cooperation between the Nordic international locations with the purpose of halting the unfold of Swedish prison gangs.
In their newest annual report on threats from prison networks, Norwegian police admit that Swedish gangs are actually working in all areas of the nation. Denmark introduced final yr that it will strengthen police controls on the border with Sweden. Iceland can also be dealing with its personal disaster, with a number of seizures in current months which are unprecedented within the nation’s historical past, each by way of the portions and purity of the medication.
Danish Justice Minister Peter Hummelgard, a Social Democrat, justified the tightening of border controls with the neighboring nation: “The actuality proper now’s that not solely Denmark however giant elements of the Nordic international locations are struggling the results of Sweden’s failed immigration and integration insurance policies, and we take this matter very critically.”
Normalization amongst youths
The improve within the cocaine inflow into Norway is mirrored in quite a few statistics. Consumption amongst younger folks ages 15 to 34 is the third highest on the continent, behind solely The Netherlands and Ireland, in keeping with the most recent report from the European Drug Agency. A examine by the identical company, based mostly on wastewater evaluation, revealed that cocaine use in Oslo has tripled for the reason that finish of the Covid pandemic. And, in keeping with an Ipsos survey, 1 / 4 of Norwegians ages 16 to 19 take into account the white powder to be as frequent as alcohol at events.
Furthermore, a report by the Norwegian Institute of Public Health from late 2024 underscores that 17% of boys and eight% of women of their remaining yr of secondary college used this drug throughout that yr. The variety of residents in therapy for cocaine dependancy has additionally skyrocketed within the Scandinavian nation.
It’s not simply the numbers. The abundance of medicine in Norway can also be mirrored on the streets, particularly within the Greenland neighborhood, proper within the heart of Oslo. A district of simply over 10,000 residents, most of them foreign-born, it has change into the epicenter of drug trafficking within the Scandinavian nation. “It’s the place in Norway the place probably the most medication are offered,” says Gundersen. Around the subway entrances, and regardless of the frequent presence of patrol automobiles, there are younger folks — and never so younger — providing cannabis and cocaine to passersby virtually at any time of day. Many transfer round on electrical scooters and both don’t carry medication or solely carry tiny quantities, to keep away from severe issues with the police.
However, you don’t should go to Greenland to get medication in Oslo. “Most younger folks purchase them by social media or on the spot messaging apps like Snapchat,” notes Tandero Schaug. “Getting cocaine is less complicated than shopping for alcohol: nobody will verify your authorized age. And it arrives at your private home sooner than a pizza supply.”
The problem, authorities acknowledge, isn’t solely to stem the movement of medicine, but in addition to halt a normalization that has already permeated Norwegian society. Tandero Schaug wonders what the state of affairs might be like in 5 years. She doesn’t rule out Norwegian customs officers beginning to carry weapons, as has been the case in Sweden since final December. Even so, she is assured that the development will be reversed: “I hope that, at the very least, shopping for cocaine will return to what it was like once I was younger; that it’ll require some contacts, that it’ll require a minimal effort to get it.”
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