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Foreign cocaine peddlers sniff for tourists in Lanka
Two Brazilian nationals arrested while trying to smuggle in cocaine to the country were planning to sell the drug to foreign tourists in Sri Lanka, preliminary police investigations have revealed.
Cocaine in pellets: One of the recent hauls detected at the BIA. Pic by Prasad Muthukuda
The suspects, aged 30 and 24 years, were taken into custody by officers from the Police Narcotics Bureau (PNB) at the Bandaranaike International Airport. The arrest of one of the Brazilians last Saturday (June 31) led to the arrest of the other who came the next day. Both men had arrived on flights from Doha, Qatar.
PNB Director Deputy Inspector General of Police (DIG) S.C. Medawatta said the two suspects had been booked into a hotel in Hikkaduwa. Police believe they were planning to sell the cocaine to foreign tourists at tourist hot spots in the South and elsewhere.
The market for cocaine in the country is still low, mainly due to its prohibitive price. While much of the drug must have been destined for foreigners, police say there may also be local customers from affluent backgrounds. Investigations are ongoing to determine whether the Brazilians had a network in the country and whether anyone here was involved, the PNB Head said.
The suspects are currently being held under detention orders. Authorities have notified the Brazilian Embassy. They also hope to get information about their travel plans while in the country from the hotel in Hikkaduwa.
Until this arrest PNB had encountered individuals trying to smuggle in heroin inside pellets they had swallowed. This was the first time that PNB sleuths came across individuals who had swallowed pellets with cocoaine DIG Medawatta disclosed.
In February, this year, Customs officers arrested another Brazilian national at the airport while trying to smuggle in 690g of cocaine in pellets. This was the first arrest of a person trying to smuggle in cocaine in pellets into the country. The PNB’s detection last week was larger, with 91 pellets containing 970g of cocaine found on the 30 year-old suspect, and 75 pellets containing 698g found on the 24-year-old suspect. In total, police recovered more than 2kg of cocaine from the two suspects. The seized drugs have a street value of some Rs.50 million.
Sri Lanka is still generally considered to be a transit point for cocaine rather than an actual market. In January, this year, authorities publicly destroyed 928kg of cocaine valued at over USD 108 million. They included drugs seized from various shipments that were transiting through Sri Lanka in the past three years. The large scale detections of the drug made over the past few years have always been destined for markets elsewhere, according to police.
While the arrest of three Brazilian cocaine smugglers in a span of a few months has hinted at a market for the drug among foreigners visiting the island, police pointed out that the main drugs n circulation are heroin and Kerala Cannabis.
According to Police 36.45 kg of heroin has been seized by police from January 1 to July 2 this year. In comparison,last year, the quantity of heroin seized by police amounted to over 278kg while more than 196kg was seized in 2016. Last year and the year before also saw the largest number of heroin related arrests in recent years, with 29, 272 and 27, 458 arrests respectively.
Police Spokesman Superintendent of Police (SP) Ruwan Gunasekara said that the quantity of heroin detected in the country had decreased this year. He said the reduction was partly due to increased raids in the past two years, and an increase in the price of heroin. On the other hand, more Kerala Cannabis was being detected in the country.
Police Headquarters, however, is optimistic that the quantity of Kerala Cannabis coming into the country would also reduce in the coming months after police recently busted a major network involving the smuggling of the drug from India to Mannar by boat.