Dubai: An attempt to smuggle more than 130kg of pure heroin with a retail value of Dh65 million through Jebel Ali Port has been foiled by the Dubai Police General Anti-Narcotics Department.
This was the biggest narcotics haul made this year in a single operation, according to Major General Abdul Jalil Mahdi, Director of the Department.
The drugs were hidden in a container that arrived on a ship originating from Pakistan.
"The container, which contained iron filings, left Pakistan on July 23 and transited in Salalah Port in Oman, Tangier Port in Morocco and Tin Can Port in Nigeria before arriving in Dubai on October 8," Maj Gen Mahdi said.
The ship was scheduled to return to Pakistan on October 12, but a reliable informant confirmed that one of the containers on the Liberian ship carried a huge amount of drugs. Initial inspection of the ship's documents and load showed nothing suspicious, but the police decided to offload the iron filings container to inspect it further.
Nothing suspicious
"Scanning the container showed nothing suspicious, because of the density of the iron filings, and even trained police dogs find it very hard to identify any suspicious material with this kind of load," Maj Gen Mahdi said.
After the bags containing the steel filings were manually inspected, a decision was made to offload the entire amount and keep searching, as the tip-off about the drugs came from a reliable source.
"After removing all the bags, our inspectors decided to check the wooden pallets under the load, only to find that the legs of these pallets were hollow, and this is where the drugs were hidden," Major General Mahdi said. Inside ach leg was a plastic bag containing between 500 and 700 grams of pure heroin.
A total of 130kg of heroin was found in the pallet legs, with a wholesale value of Dh10 million and a retail sale value of Dh65 million. The international gang behind the smuggling attempt was identified and the Pakistani authorities have been informed to start their procedures to arrest the gang members, Maj Gen Mahdi said.
