KHYBER: Khyber police claimed to have made a big seizure of heroin during a raid on a heroin manufacturing factory in Jamrud on Monday.

Sharing details of the raid with local journalists, DPO Salim Abbas Kulachi said that his force recovered 70 kilogrammes of heroin along with ten kilogrammes of chemicals used in heroin manufacturing.

“This is the biggest seizure of any type of narcotics in Khyber since the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Police Act was extended to the newly merged tribal districts in 2019,” he said, adding that his force had made similar seizures in the past 10 days in Landi Kotal and Ali Masjid as the police had intensified its operations against drug dealers and peddlers.

He said a raid was conducted on a house in Jamrud on the night between Sunday and Monday and busted a heroin factory. “The factory operators, who managed to escape prior to the raid, had dumped the seized heroin in a well, dug out inside the said house for concealing drugs but our force was able to retrieve the heroin from the dry well,” he added.

He added that the factory operators were Afghan nationals and had rented the house. He acknowledged that some terror outfits operating in pockets of Khyber were hand in glove with these drug dealers as they got financial benefits from this illegal business and later used these ill-gotten funds in acts of terrorism in different parts of the country.

He said that an international racket of narcotics dealers was also involved in trafficking drugs to foreign countries. He said hectic efforts were underway to apprehend suspects involved in heroin making and supply of illegal drugs to down country.

Published in Dawn, January 16th, 2024