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21-07-2024
PRETORIA/ LIMPOPO: South African police have uncovered an industrial-scale meth lab and arrested four suspects, including two Mexicans, in one of the country’s biggest-ever drug busts.
The laboratory was discovered on a farm in Groblersdal, a small town in Limpopo province in the northeast of the country, the police said in a statement on Saturday.
Limpopo is the northernmost province of South Africa; it borders Botswana, Zimbabwe and Mozambique.
Law enforcement agents found large quantities of chemicals, such as acetone, used in the manufacturing of illicit drugs, including crystal meth, with an estimated street value of 2 billion rand ($109.5m), the statement said.
“What makes this different from other (seizures) is the involvement of Mexican citizens,” said Katlego Mogale, national spokesperson for the Hawks, an elite police unit that took part in the raid.
“It means that our task has just become very difficult,” she told the Reuters news agency.
It is not clear whether the suspects were manufacturing drugs to distribute within the country or elsewhere, she said.
South Africa is a major drug transit country due to its geography and international trade links and is also a growing market for synthetic drugs, according to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime.
Methamphetamine trafficking, in particular, is on the rise in Africa, the UN agency said in its 2023 World Drug Report.
The UN describes methamphetamine as a powerful and highly addictive stimulant that impacts the central nervous system and can cause a rapid or irregular heartbeat.
The United States Drug Enforcement Administration warns that high doses of the substance “may result in death from stroke, heart attack or multiple organ problems caused by overheating”.
Acetone is a colourless liquid used to produce a variety of products, including solvents for paints and plastics, but it can also be also used illegally to produce drugs. As the investigation continues, the arrested suspects will make their first court appearance on Monday on charges of manufacturing, dealing and possession of illicit drugs, the police statement said.
The countries of Eastern and Southern Africa have a long history of illicit drug cultivation, production, consumption and trade. Khat, a crop that is indigenous to the Horn and coastal East Africa, has been used as a stimulant since the 12th century. Cannabis, originally imported from Asia, has a history of several hundred years of production and use in the region.
Initially, the informal policies surrounding the control of these drugs had been driven by traditional social networks, and cultural beliefs and practices. Today, however, it is the more recent large-scale trade in and widespread use of opiates, stimulants and other synthetic substances that has become recognized as a harmful phenomenon and risk to the region. As container and intermodal shipping grew rapidly through the 1970s, along with new long-haul mass transport and passenger aircraft, the global economic landscape in general, and illicit drug marketplaces in particular, were reshaped. The development of the region’s air and seaports, and their integration into global transport and communication networks, saw the emergence of new entrepot trade, and hubs of commerce became networked across the continent. (Int’l News Desk)
