Police seize hashish, opium worth millions of rupees

The consignment was meant for AJK.

ISLAMABAD:

The Saddar police foiled a bid to smuggle 60kg of hashish and 8kg of opium into Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK) via Islamabad on Saturday.

The Golra police officials intercepted a car (STC 4030) near Islamabad Toll Plaza in the area of Sadaat Colony in the outskirts of the city. “We had information that a car with this registration number from Peshawar was carrying drugs, so we searched it,” said Station House Officer Qasim Khan Niazi. The police also arrested the car driver.

Sajid Kiyani, the Superintendent of Police (Saddar), said this was a “significant success”. He said the route is a favourite for smugglers coming from Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa and going to AJK via Islamabad.

The driver, Muhammad Rafiq, a resident of Mardan district, told the police that he had received the car and drugs from a carrier in Peshawar and was suppose to hand it over to another dealer in Islamabad.

The drugs were concealed in secret compartments of the car. The police said the recovered hashish and opium were of good quality. “A kilogram of this type of hashish is worth about Rs20,000 or more while the opium is more expensive,” said a police official.

The suspect was shifted to the lock-up in Golra Police Station. Police said Rafiq was only one of the carriers and not the drug smuggler, who owned the consignment.

During initial investigations, Rafiq revealed that three drivers were changed since the drugs began their journey.

“They break the chain of people carrying drugs to make it more difficult for the police to seize them,” said SP Kiyani.

Rafiq had taken the car from the second driver in Peshawar and was to hand it over to a fourth one in Islamabad who was then responsible for carrying it to AJK, the final destination of the consignment, Kiyani added.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 23^rd, 2011.