‘Border Guards foil attempt to smuggle large quantity of drugs’

AMMAN — Border Guards on Monday night foiled an attempt to smuggle a large amount of narcotics through two vehicles coming from Syria, an official source at the Jordan Armed Forces-Arab Army said on Tuesday in a statement. 

The troops applied the rules of engagement taken in such cases, damaging the two vehicles and stopping them. 

The suspects who were in the vehicles fled and ran to Syrian territories.

The Border Guards confiscated 10,511 palm-sized sheets of hashish weighing 1,815kg, 44kg of narcotics of unknown types and 9.18 million narcotic pills weighing 1,647kg.

In total, the seized drugs weigh 3,506kg. In addition, the troops confiscated ammunition, and sent everything to the concerned authorities. 

In the first half of February this year, Anti-Narcotics Department (AND) agents arrested 226 suspected drug dealers in 129 cases, confiscating 39kg of hashish, 21kg of synthetic cannabis, 11,000 narcotic pills, 1kg of heroin and eight weapons, according to the Public Security Department.

Last year, AND personnel arrested 14,000 drug users of different nationalities, AND Director Brig. Gen. Anwar Tarawneh said late last month.

Tarawneh noted that Jordan remains a corridor country — rather than a destination — for drug smuggling.

Last year, Border Guards responded to trafficking attempts that resulted in the confiscation of 16,768,684 Captagon pills, 893,060 palm-sized sheets of hashish and 20,000 Tramadol pills.