DUSHANBE, October 5, Asia-Plus – The first nine months of this year have seen 13 engagements between Tajik border guards and armed drug smugglers on the Tajik-Afghan border, Tajik border’s service said.
Besides, Tajik border troops have warded off 114 attempts of violation of the border and detained 173 border violators over the same nine-month period. On the Afghan border alone, 51 attempts to illegally crossing into Tajikistan have been made in January-September this year, and 48 trespassers have been detained. The largest number of violations has been reported on the Tajik-Uzbek border, according to the source. “Over the past nine months, 77 people have been detained on this stretch of the Tajik national border for illegally crossing the border,” the source said.
More than 1,570 kilograms of drugs, with 736 kilograms of them being heroin, have been seized by Tajik border troops and in joint operations carried out by them in cooperation with other power-wielding agencies of the country over the mentioned period. “It is 1.4 times more compared to the same period of last year,” the source said, adding that 37 drug traffickers have been detained over the same nine-month period.
Over the mentioned period, more than 527 drug-containing plants have been destroyed in the country, which 3.3 time more compared to the same period of 2005.
Tajik border troops have seized 28 firearms, more than 8,000 bullets of different caliber and 150 different landmines since the beginning of the year.
