PESHAWAR, Jan 8: China has become the latest detour in the circuitous route used to smuggle heroin from Afghanistan to African countries, official sources told Dawn here on Sunday. The drug smugglers of Afghanistan in connivance with their associates in tribal areas have invented a new route for smuggling heroin to African countries by travelling to Pakistan, Dubai and then China, according to officials.

The new route was disclosed by two alleged drug smugglers who were arrested by the Anti-Narcotics Force (ANF) at Peshawar airport about two weeks ago, the sources said.

Masheen Khan, a resident of Landi Kotal tehsil of Khyber Agency, and Ejaz, a resident of Mardan district, were allegedly carrying heroin capsules in their bodies and wanted to go to Dubai by an Air Blue flight and then onward to China.

The two men told ANF interrogators that they had been assigned the task of carrying the heroin to China but they had no idea which African country they were supposed to proceed to.

Masheen Khan and Ejaz, both unemployed and belonging to poor families, were hired by two tribal drug smugglers, who had links with the international mafia, to smuggle heroin to China, a spokesman for the ANF said.

Spokesman Agha Sabaul Hassan said the two drug carriers were asked by the tribal smugglers to stay in a hotel in China and contact one person on his mobile phone and then he would arrange their travel plans to one or more African country. Both the accused had no idea how they would proceed to Africa, the spokesman added.

Masheen Khan and Ejaz were carrying 171 capsules, weighing over one kilogram of heroin in their rectum, which was hard to detect for the scanning machine installed at the airport, the ANF official said.

The spokesman said the local couriers had probably set a new trend in Pakistan because previously only African smugglers were known for carrying capsules in their body.

The accused had disclosed the names of two tribal drug smugglers having links with the international mafia. However, Agha Saba refused to divulge their names.

He said the ANF had been gathering information about the tribal drug smugglers and would soon arrest them.

He said the Chinese government had been contacted through the interior ministry and had been given information about the man who was waiting to receive Masheen Khan and Ejaz in China.