DUSHANBE, October 28, 2010, Asia-Plus — The Drug Control Agency (DCA) director Rustam Nazarov told reporters on October 27 that the DCA liaison officers operating in Afghanistan and Afghan law enforcement authorities have conducted 43 joint operations over the first nine months of this year.
According to him, the operations led to the seizure of 852.6 kilograms of narcotics. Besides, 12 heroin labs have been destroyed and 50 drug smugglers have been detained in those operations, Tajik drug control chief noted.
The agency’s liaison officers have been working in the four provinces of northern Afghanistan bordering on Tajikistan – Takhar, Balkh, Kunduz and Badakhshan – since 2005.
“35 criminal groups, including four transnational organized criminal groups, have been broken up over the report period,” Nazarov said, noting that DCA has also conducted operations in cooperation with Russian and Kazakh law enforcement authorities this year.
“A local anti-rug operation, dubbed Kanal-Yug-2010 (2010 Channel-South), was conducted from September 13 to September 16 on the territories of Tajikistan, Kazakhstan and Russia for the first time,” said the DCA director, “The operation was carried out in the framework of the regional anti-drug operation, Kanal-2010 (2010 Channel), and 1,275 kilograms of narcotics were seized during this operation.”
