QUETTA, June 7: The border security forces seized two tons of heroin following an encounter with Afghan drug smugglers near a village of the Chaghai district, some 700km west of Quetta, on Friday.

On a tip-off, Kharan Rifles troops swooped on the village of Raiay before dawn and stopped two suspected vehicles on a road, passing along the village.

Instead of stopping, the occupants of the vehicles opened indiscriminate fire on the troops, who returned the fire. Following the shootout that continued for an hour, the drug traffickers fled towards a hilly area at the Pakistan- Iran border, leaving behind both the vehicles.

On search, 2,000 packets of heroin each of one kilogramme were seized from the vehicles.

The heroin seized is worth Rs800 million in the international market, Pir Sadiq Ali Shah, Col Commandant of the Kharan Rifles, a wing of the Frontier Corps, said, while confirming to Dawn the drugs seizure.

He said the drug consignment had been brought from Afghanistan and was being smuggled to European countries via Iran.