Lebanese Army soldiers. (Credit: AFP)
BEIRUT – One Lebanese and one Syrian suspect were arrested on Tuesday aboard a van containing “a large quantity of captagon,” announced the Lebanese Army on Wednesday.
Here’s what we know:
• In early February, the Internal Security Forces (ISF) announced that they had foiled an attempt to smuggle 27 kilograms of captagon powder.
• The drugs were hidden in a box of chocolates that was ready to be shipped to an Arab country, later identified as Kuwait by Interior Minister Bassam Mawlawi.
• Lebanon has often come under scrutiny by the Gulf countries for failing to regulate drug trafficking operations from Lebanon or in transit through Lebanese territories.
In April 2021, Riyadh decided to suspend its imports of fruits and vegetables from Lebanon after more than five million pills of Captagon hidden in pomegranates that had transited through Lebanon were seized in Saudi Arabia.