DUBAI // Almost 5 million amphetamine pills were seized by police during raids in Fujairah and Dubai this month.
The Anti-Narcotics Department at Dubai Police had received a tip off that a shipment of Captagon pills, a form of amphetamine that was once produced for therapeutic use but is now banned, was being transported through the UAE from Lebanon to another Arabian Gulf country.
The drugs were hidden inside metal pipes that had been welded shut, to avoid detection, and stored in two containers.
One container was seized in the Thoban area of Fujairah on March 20, the other in Al Aweer in Dubai a short time later. Four men were arrested.
“A team made up from the Interior Ministry, police from Dubai, Sharjah, Ras Al Khaimah and Fujairah worked together to catch a criminal gang that was trying to transport 4,895,000 Captagon pills to a Gulf country,” said Dubai Police Chief Maj Gen Khamis Mattar Al Muzeina. “We arrested four people: one Egyptian, one Lebanese and two Syrians.”
He said a fifth member of the gang, its leader, had managed the smuggling operation from abroad.
“Evidence shows that the [drugs] were sent from an Arab country on behalf of the leader of the gang, M K A, who is Syrian but lives in Lebanon,” said Maj Gen Al Muzeina.
“The pills were inside metal pipes that were welded shut and put into two closed metal containers, so if they are scanned they won’t show,” he said, adding that the gang had been monitored around the clock for almost a month before they were arrested.
The containers had been transported to Al Aweer in Dubai, then to Sharjah and Ras Al Khaimah before being brought back to Al Aweer as the gang attempted to make sure they weren’t being watched, he said.
“This operation happened more than once, a move that shows that the gang is professional and wanted to make sure it was not being monitored by the authorities.”
Police arrested K H A A and J A A, both Syrian, when one of the containers was taken to Thoban, said Maj Gen Al Muzeina.
“They seized the metal unit that was welded shut and pulled out metal pipes that carried 2,492,191 pills in plastic bags,” he said.
The second container, which was filled with 2,402,819 pills, was seized in Al Aweer and the other gang members, K M M from Lebanon, and HAA, from Egypt, were arrested.
Maj Gen Al Muzeina said that had it not been intercepted, the shipment would have been transported out of the UAE after the gang made contact with a drug dealer in an Arabian Gulf country.
“The UAE’s geographical location is one of the most important in the Arab world because of its routes, air and sea, and maybe the boat [that was carrying the drugs] did not have a direct route to its final destination,” he said.
The four men who were arrested have been transferred to the public prosecution. A warrant has been issued for the leader of the gang.
“What is the point in seizing the shipment without the culprits?” said Maj Gen Al Muzeina. “What is important is those who are working in the UAE or through the UAE trying to transport drugs.
“We want to monitor them to catch them and the drugs.”
dmoukhallati@thenational.ae