Asia

Home page

Asia

Five Iranians jailed for â€˜iceâ€™ smuggling $1.3 million in ’ice’

27 August 2010 08:27 (UTC +04:00)

Baku. Suleyman Farzaliyev-APA. Five Iranian men were arrested at Suvarnabhumi Airport in three separate crystal methamphetamine smuggling cases involving a total weight of 12.3 kilogrammes of the drug, valued at Bt43 million (US$1.3 million), according to Thailand’s Customs Department, APA reports.

Customs Department Director-General Somchai Sajjapong told the media Thursday that Mohajeri Mohammadreza, 25, was detained when he failed to pass through a customs checkpoint with 510 grammes of â€˜iceâ€™ concealed in his sandals.

The arrest was made after the customs officers noticed that the man behaved suspiciously and his sandals were thicker than usual.

In the meantime, an officer rushed to detain Salimi Zanjani Davoodi, 37, who accompanied Mohammadreza to Thailand, intercepting him at an airport exit.

After searching Mr Davoodiâ€™s sandals, similar to those of Mr Mohammadrezaâ€™s, the officers found crystal methamphetamine weighing 510 grammes.

The two Iranians flew from the United Arab Emiratesâ€™s capital of Abu Dhabi to Thailand by Etihad Airways.

On Wednesday, Iranian nationals were also arrested with about 8.7 kg of liquid â€˜ice.â€™ Some 2.45 kg of â€˜iceâ€™ in a soft drink bottle and total 1.94 kg in two shampoo bottles was found in the rucksack of 26-year-old Ebrahim Jorkesh.

In the rucksack of Seyedahmad Mirbozorgi, 29, customs officers discovered 2.4 kg of â€˜iceâ€™ in a soft drink bottle and another 1.94 kg in two shampoo bottles.

The two men travelled from Amman in Jordan to Thailand.

In another case, Majid Asgharpour, 26, also an Iranian national, on August 21 was detained with crystal meth concealed in two hairspray containers and a shampoo bottle with total weights of 2.7 kg.

The detention took place as the officers observed his suspicious behaviour and asked to pass his baggage through an X-ray scanner.

Initially, all five Iranian detainees were charged with possessing and smuggling the drug into Thailand without legal permission and were transferred to narcotics suppression police for further investigation.

The customs department noted that all the five Iranian alleged drug smugglers travelled from the Syrian capital, Damascus, where the trips originated and then made transit at airports in the Middle East. They later flew to Thailand. Thai authorities assumed that it is a new route for crystal meth trafficking.