The drugs were hidden in the lower section of an empty trailer being driven by a 33-year-old resident of Termez district, Surkhandarya region. The attempted smuggling was stopped late on October 1 at the Ayritom border customs post in the region, the Customs Committee said.
During an inspection of the truck and trailer, a service dog alerted customs officers, prompting a more thorough examination. Officers subsequently found 98 packages containing hashish and opium concealed beneath the trailer.
The packages had been wrapped in four layers of polyethylene, foil and tape in an apparent attempt to prevent detection by the customs post’s X-ray inspection equipment, the committee said.
Of the 98 packages, 79 contained hashish weighing a total of 42 kg 335 g, including packaging, while the remaining 19 contained 10 kg 260 g of opium. The total weight was 52 kg 595 g.
According to the committee’s calculations, the seized drugs could have been divided into about 340,000 individual doses.
Since the beginning of the year, Uzbek customs officers, working with other law enforcement agencies, have seized more than 1.9 tons of drugs, according to the Customs Committee.
