By P. Vijian, NNN-Bernama,
New Delhi : Top Indian and Pakistani narcotics officials have warned South East Asian governments of increasing African drug dealers exploiting Asian women to smuggle heroin and that the trend will worsen as Afghanistan is enjoying a bumper opium crop.
The latest warning comes just days after the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNDOC) released its World Drug Report 2008, disclosing that Afghanistan had a record opium harvest last year of 8,200 metric tons, or 92 percent of global production and almost doubling the world’s illegal opium output since 2005.
The area devoted to cultivation of poppy in Afghanistan has surged to 193,000 hectares, double the 2005 figure, added the report.
India’s Narcotic Control Bureau (NCB) deputy-director A.P. Siddiqui said Afghanistan’s production of opium — used for processing into heroin — would surpass 8,000 tones this year and this meant a higher influx of heroin into South East Asia through India or Pakistan, two major routes frequently used by African drug traffickers.
“With China emerging as a major buyer, surely Afghanistan’s bumper crop will touch South East Asian countries like Malaysia and Thailand, and because Myanmar has reduced its cultivation for some years now,” Siddiqui told Bernama.
Since January this year, Indian authorities have arrested seven women, mostly Thai and Filipinos, who are believed to be bank-rolled by well-connected Africans to smuggle out heroin in small quantities to Asian capitals.
“There are six Thai women in Tihar Jail (in Delhi). First the Nigerians were using Thai women, but after we arrested them they shifted to other nationalities like Filipinos and Indians from the northeast. They are feeling the heat,” added Siddiqui.
The additional director of the Indian Directorate of Revenue Intelligence, P. Babu, also confirmed that African drug dealers in India were becoming more active and relying on Asian women to do the dirty job.
“It is Nigerian gangs that are involved in these peddling activities as per our initial investigations and women passengers work as carriers for payments. We cannot say ultimately the destination is Kuala Lumpur but surprisingly it has become a popular route for them,” noted Babu.
India’s neighbour Pakistan, another regular transit point for drug smugglers, is also riddled with women being used as “mules” for international drug cartels which obtain supplies from Afghanistan.
In the last six months, Pakistan’s narcotic agents seized 50 kg of heroin and 1,150 kg of hashish from traffickers of various nationalities, including three Africans and a Thai woman.
“During winter its hard to cross the snow-covered mountains, on the border between Afghanistan and Pakistan, but in spring and summer, trafficking activities increase and we expect more illicit drugs to flow to South East Asian markets these days,” a senior narcotics agent who declined to be named told Bernama.
He cautioned that the increase in production of opium in land-locked Afghanistan, because of good weather last season, would spur more trafficking and the lucrative South East Asian markets, controlled primarily by African drugs lords, would be their target.
“(In the) last six months, we arrested more than 18 traffickers heading to Kuala Lumpur to supply to the Nigerian mafia, Africans and some Europeans operating in South East Asia,” he said.
“These countries should try to reduce the demand and impose stringent punishment as a deterrent for traffickers.”
Malaysia already imposes a mandatory death sentence on those found guilty of possession of dangerous drugs.