Khatlon province stands in first place among Tajikistan’s regions in terms of amount of contraband drugs seized.
In a report released at a news conference in Dushanbe, the director of the Drug Control Agency (DCA) under the President of Tajikistan, Samad Zafar Taghoi, relieved on July 29 that Khatlon province has accounted for 44.6 percent of narcotic drugs seized in the country over the first six months of this year.
“3,096.611 kilograms of narcotic drugs have been seized in Tajikistan over the first six months of this year, which is 619 kilograms or 25 percent more than in the same period last year,” Tajik drug control kingpin said.
According to him, bulk of drugs – 1,381 kilograms, which is 44.6 percent of narcotic drugs seized in the country over the reporting period – has been seized in Khatlon province, where drugs are smuggled from Afghanistan.
Tajik chief drug control officer further noted that 13,731 tablets of psychotropic drugs (4.6-fold increase compared to January-June last year) and 84 kilograms of psychotropic substances in the form of powder, with 80.971 kilograms of them being methamphetamine, have bene confiscated in the country over the same six-month period.
At the same time, the DCA director noted that there are no drug laboratories in the country and “they enter the country smuggled from abroad, mostly from Afghanistan.”
He noted that there is cooperation between narcotic countering agencies of Tajikistan and Afghanistan and accordingly, there are no joint operations or activities to combat drug trafficking.
Over the first six months, 10 foreign nationals, including five nationals of Afghanistan, three nationals of Uzbekistan, one of Kazakhstan and one of Kyrgyzstan, have been detained in Tajikistan for drug trafficking, which is five people more than in the same period last year. A total of 235 kilograms of narcotic drugs have reportedly been confiscated from them.
