Following the interception of a significant drug smuggling effort, Syrian authorities implicated residues of the ousted Assad federal government of running the mob rings
Syrian authorities on Wednesday effectively foiled an effort to smuggle a considerable amount of illegal stimulant tablets throughout the Syrian-Jordanian border, avoiding the narcotics from getting in Jordan. This interception highlights the brand-new Syrian federal government’s decision to avoid regional instability from being made use of at the hands of criminal networks.
The Syrian Ministry of Interior revealed that its Anti-Narcotics Directorate took 100,000 of the stimulant tablets called Captagon near the border. In a declaration to The Media Line, the ministry’s media workplace verified that the seized delivery was meant for smuggling into Jordan, stressing that legal steps would be taken versus those included.
Speaking anonymously to The Media Line, a security source stated that Syrian counternarcotics forces are identified not to let Syria end up being a risk to surrounding nations and the larger area. “We will continue to fight drug production, trafficking, and take apart networks at their source,” the source stated.
The source went on to implicate residues of the ousted Assad program of being deeply associated with drug production and smuggling operations. He worried that the existing Syrian administration is undaunted in its efforts to face and take apart these networks.
The illegal drug trade, especially including Captagon, thrived throughout the Syrian civil war. According to different intelligence reports, then-President Bashar Assad and his bro Maher Assad, who commanded Syria’s infamous fourth Armored Department, supervised a huge, advanced drug production and smuggling network. That network supposedly funnelled narcotics throughout the area– with Jordan functioning as a main transit indicate Gulf nations and beyond.
Given that the escalation of the Israel-Hezbollah dispute last summer season and the fall of the Assad program in December 2024, the drug sell Syria has actually supposedly decreased. Syrian authorities are working to take apart the staying drug production centers and assert control over border areas afflicted by smuggling activities.
In January 2025, Jordan and Syria developed a joint security committee to boost border security and suppress the smuggling of weapons and narcotics. This effort followed Syrian Foreign Minister Asaad al-Shaibani’s see to Jordan, throughout which both sides vowed to magnify cooperation to protect their borders.
Jordanian authorities report hindering many smuggling efforts, typically performed by moles connected to Iranian-backed militias running in southern Syria.
In Might 2024, Jordanian forces discovered an effort to smuggle weapons and dynamites from Syria into Jordan, presumably meant to arm and hire fighters for Hamas. That effort was believed to be connected to Iran.
Iran has actually regularly rejected any participation in smuggling activities along the Syrian-Jordanian border, whether of arms or narcotics.