DUSHANBE, July 10, Asia-Plus — Tajik border guards have stopped an attempt by Afghan drug trafficker to smuggle drugs into Tajikistan.
According to the border protection directorate of the State Committee for National Security, the border guards on a routine patrol spotted and tried to detain a group of armed Afghan drug traffickers numbering three or four persons who were illegally crossing the border river in the Hamadoni district in Khatlon on July 2.
Khushnud Rahamtulloyev, a spokesman for the border protection directorate, said that the border guards had later fired at the trespassers after they had tried to flee. As a result of a skirmish, one of trespassers was killed and others returned to the Afghan territory.
Sub-machine-gun Kalashnikov as well as several packages containing some 4.5 kilograms of heroin and 3.5 kilograms of cannabis were found on the scene of action, the spokesman said.
Criminal proceedings have been instituted and an investigation is under way.
