In Jordan-Syria border 27 drug smugglers killed, Jordanian army says
Jordanian soldiers killed 27 armed drug smugglers as they tried to enter Syria on Thursday, an army spokesman said.
Smugglers were "backed up by armed groups" who managed to flee back into Syrian territory, the spokesman said in a statement.
"Large quantities of narcotics" were seized from the crime scene, he said. The army statement said they encountered smugglers on different fronts on the border with Syria and that there were multiple, coordinated operations to take them down.
Another army spokesman is not yet clear what type of drugs were seized. The spokesman, who asked to remain anonymous per Jordanian Army protocol, said that snowy weather conditions slowed the investigation.
Jordanian authorities say they have been seizing more and more drugs flooding in from Syria in recent years. United Nations officials have warned of a growing number of security incidents related to Syrian drug smuggling.
According to army figures, the number of drugs seized in 2021 was double that in 2020, with January on track to set a monthly record for drug busts.
The Jordanian Armed Forces said this month alone that more than five million Captagon pills brought into Jordan from Syria had been confiscated.
Captagon is a common stimulant used as an alternative to amphetamine and methamphetamine in the Middle East. It's also used in some countries bordering the European Union. Captagon was initially the brand name for a medicinal product containing fenethylline's synthetic stimulant.
According to the European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction, though it is no longer produced legally, drugs carrying the Captagon name are regularly seized in the Middle East.
Jordanian authorities have accused ISIS of producing the drug and selling it to finance terrorist activities. In 2015, a US official alleged that the terror group was giving the medication to its fighters.
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