Since Assad’s fall, the new authorities have reported numerous major seizures of captagon across the country [Getty]
Anti-narcotics authorities from Syria and Iraq have seized 2.5 million captagon stimulant pills after carrying out raids in both countries, Syria’s interior ministry said on Thursday.
Two people were arrested in Syria and one in Iraq in the joint operations, the ministry said in a statement.
The ministry said the successful raids were “the result of systematic intelligence work” between Damascus and Baghdad.
The arrests took place in “the governorates of Homs and Rural Damascus” in Syria and “territory inside the Republic of Iraq”, it added.
Syrian state media SANA said the operation was a “major bust” which “disrupted the network’s operational and logistical capabilities” by cutting off one of the network’s main trafficking routes, without specifying.
Captagon, a powerful synthetic stimulant, became Syria’s largest export during the civil war that erupted in 2011, with its trade serving as a key funding source for the government of ousted president Bashar al-Assad.
Since Assad’s fall, the new authorities have reported numerous major seizures of captagon across the country. However, neighbouring countries continue to report the interception of large shipments.
