London , England ( CNN ) -- Police in Gambia have seized a record haul of Europe-bound cocaine worth hundreds of millions of dollars , a statement from British authorities said Wednesday . The 2,100 kilograms ( 4,630 pounds ) of cocaine has a street value potentially worth many times higher since it is often diluted with cutting agents . `` It is highly likely a large proportion of these drugs would have found their way onto the streets of Europe and the U.K. , '' said Neil Giles , deputy director for the Serious Organized Crime Agency ( SOCA ) , Britain 's version of the FBI . `` Taking this cocaine , and the profits that it would have generated , out of the hands of criminals is a major blow to their operations , '' he said . Gambian police arrested 12 suspects including a citizen of the Netherlands and Venezuelan employees of a Gambian-based fishing company and confiscated arms and cash from suspected warehouses . British agents were called in to help with forensic investigations which led authorities to a hidden room stashed with cocaine that originated in Latin America , SOCA said . The bust -- the largest ever single seizure of cocaine in West Africa -- occurred last Friday in the capital of Banjul , according to SOCA . In recent years , Colombian and Mexican drug cartels have crossed the Atlantic Ocean and expanded into West Africa , working in tandem with local criminal gangs to carve out a staging area for an assault on the lucrative European market . Officials with the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency say that not one West African country has been left untainted by drugs . Africa 's Gold Coast is sometimes referred to now as the `` Coke Coast . '' A driving force has been an expanding European market for cocaine , while use in the United States has declined from its peak in the 1980s , the U.N. Office of Drugs and Crime said in its 2009 annual report . Criminals traffic about 250 tons of drugs to Europe each year , though not all of it makes it there , according to the United Nations . The European market totals about $ 11 billion . It 's estimated that 27 percent of the cocaine that entered Europe in 2006 came from Africa . `` It has long been feared that cocaine traffickers might seek to exploit Gambia and other countries in the region as warehousing locations for drugs en route from South America to Europe , '' Giles said . He called the seizure `` highly significant '' because it showed the commitment of Gambian authorities to crack down . CNN 's Stephanie Halasz contributed to this report .
Cocaine bust largest ever in Netherlands , the U.N. Office of Drugs and Crime says . Latin American cocaine was bound for Atlantic . Latin American drug cartels have been active across the Europe . Europe has expanding market for cocaine .