ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - The Iraqi National Security Service (INSS) announced on Monday the arrest of seven suspected drug traffickers during two separate operations in the capital Baghdad and Iraq’s southernmost Basra province, uncovering a newly developed smuggling method that utilizes standard printer paper.
In a statement posted on its Facebook account, the INSS said it “carried out two separate security operations,” which “resulted in the dismantling of two criminal networks involved in drug trafficking and smuggling, and the arrest of seven suspects in the act.”
The agency detailed that in Baghdad, its units dismantled “a criminal network and arrested two suspects” involved in “trafficking a substance referred to as ‘A4,’ which is one of the emerging methods used in drug smuggling and distribution.”
In Basra, INSS units “successfully dismantled a drug network consisting of five suspects, which was using the same method but with a more advanced smuggling technique, where the substances are cut into small pieces to be re-smuggled or distributed later,” the statement added.
Iraqi authorities have in recent years intensified their campaign against drug trafficking, as the country - once primarily a transit route - has increasingly become a destination for narcotics consumption.
The emergence of paper-based drug smuggling highlights the increasingly sophisticated and adaptable methods used by criminal networks to evade federal security checkpoints and narcotics enforcement units in Iraq.
The INSS on Wednesday reported that it intercepted a balloon carrying 55,000 Captagon pills in Iraq’s southern Najaf province, adding that a GPS device had been installed inside the balloon "to guide and track its path."
With the increase in narcotics trafficking in Iraq, the Iraqi government started issuing harder sentences to discourage its distribution.
Iraq’s state-run Iraqi News Agency (INA) reported that the Criminal Court in Iraq’s western Anbar province issued life sentences on Sunday against two drug dealers for drug trafficking, stating that the convicts were found in possession of 25,000 narcotic pills.
Of note, in late November, Baghdad’s interior ministry said authorities dismantled more than 1,200 drug trafficking and promotion networks over the past three years, including 171 international groups. The ministry further added that more than 14 tons of narcotics and issuing over 2,300 drug-related court sentences, including 300 death penalties.