250 kg pills with the name engraved on them Captagon spotted by German authorities during a raid on a warehouse near the city of Regensburg a year ago. THE carefully wrapped in amphetamine plastic found in bags with fragments of marblewith country of origin on Syria and destination Saudi Arabia.
Two Syrians, who are linked to the attack, are sitting in the Regensburg district court on Friday. According to the authorities, acted as intermediaries on behalf of an organization drug trafficking based in Lebanon and links with the regime in neighboring Syria.
Assad is a piece of the puzzle
Experts have no doubt that people from the environment of Bashar al-Assad are linked to the “explosion” of methamphetamine production and distribution, with a stopover in Europe. “People are involved who are closely linked to the regime,” said Jihad Yazigi, editor-in-chief of Syria Report. The production of the Captagon in Syria dates back to the 2000s. With the 2011 uprising that led to the civil war and the collapse of the economy, warlords and armed groups in search of new sources of funding turned to the manufacture of drugs.
As the Assad regime began to gain ground militarily, such illegal but lucrative operations reasonably passed into the hands of individuals from its circle. Today, members of the government themselves are among the protagonists of the Captagon trade, according to a recent New York Times survey. According to the same source, the production and distribution of the pills is largely controlled by the Fourth Division of the army, commanded by Bashar al-Assad Mahir’s brother.
A profitable business
It is estimated that the production of a pill it costs only a few tens of cents of euros. Selling it can pay off up to 23 euros, depending on the quality and the market where it ends. For Assad and his people, who are almost cut off from the global economy by sanctions, it is a billion-dollar business that helps them stay in power.
According to recent research, a piece of pie Lebanon’s Hezbollah is also claiming. Many production facilities are located on Syria’s border with the neighboring country, which is also an important part of the drug trafficking chain. Last year alone, Lebanese authorities identified more than 42 million pills, a record number from previous years.
“Their imagination has no limits”
Authorities are convinced that Germany is a hub for the route of the pills from Syria to their final destination, while last year there were other arrests of people believed to have coordinated the transport of Captagon cargo. via the port of Constanta in Romania.
In 2018, customs in Hamburg found 175 kg of methamphetamine pills hidden in furniture from Syria. “The perpetrators are making great efforts to hide the pills. “Their imagination has no limits,” said an investigator dealing with the case. A typical example is the detection, last December, of Captagon tablets in oranges in Lebanon.
DW / Jan Kulman, dpa / Editor: Katerina Alexandridi
Follow Skai.gr on Google News
and be the first to know all the news
