Dutch police bust giant ecstasy lab, arrest four

AMSTERDAM, Feb 1 (Reuters) Dutch police arrested four people in a raid on one of western Europe's biggest illegal drug laboratories making ecstasy, officials said.

The laboratory, located in the small, picturesque Dutch town of Haarlem, was capable of producing 100,000 ecstasy pills an hour, a spokesman for the Dutch national prosecutor said yesterday.

''In terms of size, this laboratory is equal to the one uncovered in the Netherlands in 2005 and ... is one of the biggest found in Western Europe,'' the spokesman said.

Police estimate that the laboratory had probably produced a total of 6 to 8 million ecstasy pills since it was set up, the spokesman said but could not give other details.

An ecstasy pill, the illegal recreational drug blamed by doctors for also causing depression and anxiety, has a street value of about 4 euros (5.18 dollars) in Amsterdam, a police spokeswoman said.

Anti-narcotics officers raided the laboratory on Tuesday and arrested four people, two of whom were in the building where the laboratory was found, she said.

Reuters SBA VP0423