Captagon pills seized in December 2021 by the Internal Security Forces. (Credit: ISF)
BEIRUT — The Internal Security Forces (ISF) announced Saturday that it busted an attempt to smuggle a large quantity of captagon narcotics to Saudi Arabia, days after Lebanon’s interior minister said that country was undertaking efforts to curtail the outflow of illicit goods from the country.
Here is what we know:
• In a statement, the ISF said that it “thwarted an operation to smuggle four million captagon pills hidden in coffee bags bound for Saudi Arabia via Jordan.”
• The security agency said that it had surveilled members of the smuggling cell and it raided a depot in the Bir Hassan suburb south of Beirut, where it seized the narcotics cache.
• The ISF added that a Lebanese suspect was arrested at Beirut’s Rafik Hariri International Airport, while a Syrian national allegedly involved in the case wa apprehended in the town of Aramoun south of Lebanon’s capital.
• “The two suspects confessed that they were preparing to illegally send the captagon to its destination,” the statement said.
• Saudi Arabia on Oct. 29 announced a ban of Lebanese imports, saying that the measure was taken to protect the kingdom from narcotics being dispatched from Lebanese ports.
• On Dec. 6, Interior Minister Bassam Mawlawi said that Lebanon’s cabinet would take measures to stop the trafficking of illicit goods, but did not go into details on its plan. Premier Najib Mikati’s government has not convened since Oct. 12.