Jordan seizes 0.5m narcotic pills from Syria, hours after opening border

Jordanian authorities announced the seizure of a huge haul of narcotic pills in an attempted smuggling operation through its Jaber crossing at the Syrian border, just hours after the crossing was reopened.

According to Jordan’s Public Security Directorate on Wednesday: “Information has been received for employees of the Drugs Control Department, security services, and customs working at the Jaber border crossing about an attempt to smuggle large quantities of narcotic pills by means of a cargo vehicle.”

The directorate stated that as soon as the cargo vehicle suspected of carrying drugs passed the crossing, it was identified and halted by the authorities. When they searched the vehicle, “half a million narcotic pills were found hidden in secret compartments inside an industrial machine.” It added that “the investigation is still ongoing.”

Almost a week after lifting all restrictions on the movement between #Syria and #Jordan through Nasib-Jaber border crossing, Anti-narcotic Department said it discovered 500k captagon pill coming from Syria. Jordanian army intercept drug shipments through borders on weekly basis pic.twitter.com/fpGpBMGyM4

— Suhail AlGhazi (@putintintin1) August 4, 2021

Last weekend, Jordan was set to fully reopen the Jaber-Nasib crossing on the Syrian border in order to enable the flow of goods and passengers between the two countries. That reopening was cancelled, however, due to Amman’s “security concerns” following the renewed uprising in Daraa, the southern Syrian province bordering Jordan and the crossing.

In a statement to the pro-Syrian regime newspaper Athr Press, though, the Vice-Chairman of the Export Committee of the Federation of Syrian Chambers of Commerce, Fayez Qasouma, said that the border was partially opened on Wednesday morning only for cargo vehicles.

The discovery and seizure of the half a million narcotic pills is the latest busting of a drug smuggling operation coming from Syria. Over the past year, such operations have increased and have been exported to various countries in the region and in Europe in an apparent effort to fund the Syrian regime and enable it to circumvent international sanctions.

READ: World’s largest drug haul was shipped by Assad regime, not Daesh