The Nigeria Police Force has recorded a major success in its ongoing clampdown on transnational organised crime with the recovery of two luxury vehicles stolen from the Netherlands and smuggled into Nigeria.
In a coordinated international operation, operatives of the INTERPOL National Central Bureau (NCB), Abuja, working closely with their counterparts at INTERPOL NCB The Hague, traced and recovered a 2020 Toyota C-HR and a 2019 Toyota RAV4 from separate locations in Lagos and Akwa Ibom States.
According to a statement issued on Monday by the Force Public Relations Officer, CSP Olumuyiwa Adejobi, the investigation revealed that the two vehicles were stolen from Amsterdam and Midden-Nederland before being illegally shipped to Nigeria through the Port of Antwerp, Belgium, and arrived at Apapa Port, Lagos, late last year.
Following the recovery, the Police, through INTERPOL NCB Abuja, initiated civil forfeiture proceedings at the Federal High Court, Abuja, which subsequently granted a final forfeiture order in favour of the Government of the Netherlands, acting through the vehicles’ insurance company.
The legal clearance paved the way for the formal handover of the vehicles on Monday, October 20, 2025, to representatives of the insurance company and the Embassy of the Kingdom of the Netherlands in Nigeria, marking the completion of the cross-border restitution process.
The Inspector-General of Police, IGP Kayode Egbetokun, commended the professionalism and diligence of the INTERPOL team, describing the operation as a “powerful demonstration of international law enforcement cooperation.”
> “This success underscores our unwavering commitment to global policing partnerships and to ensuring that criminal syndicates involved in cross-border vehicle theft and smuggling are deprived of the proceeds of their crimes,” Egbetokun said.
He further emphasized that the Nigeria Police Force will continue to deepen collaborations with global law enforcement agencies to combat transnational crimes and enhance intelligence-sharing frameworks.
The recovery and repatriation, analysts say, demonstrate growing synergy between Nigerian security agencies and their foreign partners in tracking, retrieving, and returning stolen assets across international borders.
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