'Don't know how cocaine got in the box'

A Nigerian transit passenger who carried 3.378 kilos of cocaine stuffed in the carton of a coffee blender claimed that someone had asked him to carry the blender and to hand it over to a person in his country.

SE, 35, told the Dubai Criminal Court that at the airport of the country he was travelling from, a person approached him and asked him to carry with him a bag which contained the coffee blender.

"I asked police at the departure airport to search the bag before I carry it.

They did that and told me that there was nothing wrong with it, so I carried it," SE told the jury presided over by Al Saeed Mohammed Barghouth.

He denied the accusation and pleaded not guilty.

"I do not know from where the drugs came. I am sure there was nothing wrong with the bag. Police have searched it," SE pleaded.

Murad Abdullah, a policeman testified that on June 14, while was on duty at Terminal 3 of Dubai International Airport he suspected SE, a passenger in the transit zone.

The policeman approached the passenger and asked him about his passport and the bag with him to inspect it.

The scanning machine showed strange bodies and while inspecting the passenger's luggage, police found that one of the bags contained a box of vacuum cleaner and another of a coffee blender.

Suspecting the carton of the coffee blender as it was unusually thick, police confiscated a white substance wrapped in nylon, scotch-taped and stuffed inside the carton.

The policeman testified before the prosecution that the accused who denied knowing anything about the substance has admitted that someone called Anokowil has handed him over the nylon bag to deliver it someone in Nigeria called Emanuel and that he does not know what is in the bag.

The Court adjourned the case until September 21 for verdict.