Police claimed they smashed the biggest methamphetamine lab ever uncovered in the Southern Hemisphere after raiding a factory Tuesday in Fiji's capital and seizing drugs and enough chemicals to make US$540 million worth of the party drug "ice."
The raids on three warehouses on Suva's outskirts underscored recent warnings by Australia and New Zealand that South Pacific islands could become havens for international organized crime if they don't boost policing, end corruption and bolster their economies.
The illegal drugs were headed for markets in Australia, New Zealand, US and Europe, Fiji police commissioner Andrew Hughes said.
Seven people, including four Asians and three Fijians, were arrested and being questioned by police, Hughes said. They may appear in court Thursday, he said. Their identities and the nationalities of the non-Fijians were not disclosed.
Fiji's parliament is debating tougher drug laws that would increase sentences for serious drug offenses from a maximum of 20 years to life in prison, and increase fines that can be imposed to up to F$1 million (US$540,000).
Hughes said the laboratory, on an industrial estate, was set up to produce the party drug methamphetamine, known as "ice," in what he called the largest such laboratory ever found in the hemisphere.
Dozens of officers involved in the raids wore special chemical resistant overalls as they searched the buildings.
"This is a frightening example of transnational organized crime elements using Fiji as a staging ground for their illegal activities," Hughes told reporters. "Increasingly we are seeing these elements coming to Fiji and joining up with local organized criminal groups."
Some 46 police and customs officers found drugs "bubbling away" in a complex Hughes said was stacked with drums of chemicals and equipment.
An initial assessment of the chemicals found in the warehouses estimated there was enough to produce 1,000kg of crystal methamphetamine, he said.
The estimated value of the seizure -- F$1 billion (US$540 million) -- equated to the small amount of methamphetamine that police discovered plus the amount that could have been produced with the chemicals found during the raid.
Hughes said the laboratory had the capacity to produce 500kg of the drug each week.
The drug-producing operation was detected by a joint Fiji customs and police transnational crime unit established 14 months ago. They waited until Wednesday to raid the operation because it only just started producing the drugs, Hughes said.
KINGPIN: Marset allegedly laundered the proceeds of his drug enterprise by purchasing and sponsoring professional soccer teams and even put himself in the starting lineups Notorious Latin American narco trafficker Sebastian Marset, who eluded police for years, was handed over to US authorities after his arrest on Friday in Bolivia. Marset, a Uruguayan national who was on the US most-wanted list, was passed to agents of the US Drug Enforcement Administration at Santa Cruz airport in Bolivia, then put on a US airplane, Bolivian state television showed. “The arrest and deportation were carried out pursuant to a court order issued by the US justice system,” Bolivian Minister of Government Marco Antonio Oviedo told reporters. The alleged kingpin was arrested in an upscale neighborhood of Santa
FAKE NEWS? ‘When the government demands the press become a state mouthpiece under the threat of punishment, something has gone very wrong,’ a civic group said The top US broadcast regulator on Saturday threatened media outlets over negative coverage of the Middle East war, after US President Donald Trump slammed critical headlines from the “Fake News Media.” The US president since his first term has derided mainstream media as “fake news” and has sued major outlets over what he sees as unfair coverage. Brendan Carr, head of the US Federal Communications Commission — which oversees the nation’s radio, television and Internet media — said broadcasters risked losing their licenses over news coverage. “The law is clear. Broadcasters must operate in the public interest, and they will
SCANDAL: Other images discovered earlier show Andrew bent over a female and lying across the laps of a number of women, while Mandelson is pictured in his underpants A photograph of former British prince Andrew and veteran politician Peter Mandelson sitting in bathrobes alongside late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein was unearthed on Friday in previously published documents. The image is believed to be the first known photograph of the two men with Epstein. They are currently engulfed in scandal in the UK over their ties to their mutual friend. The undated photograph, first reported by ITV News, shows King Charles III’s disgraced brother and former British ambassador to the US sitting barefoot outside on a wooden deck. They appear to have mugs with a US flag on them
INFLUTENTIAL THEORIST: Habermas was particularly critical of the ‘limited interest’ shown by German politicians in ‘shaping a politically effective Europe Jurgen Habermas, whose work on communication, rationality and sociology made him one of the world’s most influential philosophers and a key intellectual figure in his native Germany, has died. He was 96. Habermas’ publisher, Suhrkamp, said he died on Saturday in Starnberg, near Munich. Habermas frequently weighed in on political matters over several decades. His extensive writing crossed the boundaries of academic and philosophical disciplines, providing a vision of modern society and social interaction. His best-known works included the two-volume Theory of Communicative Action. Habermas, who was 15 at the time of Nazi Germany’s defeat, later recalled the dawn of
RSS