The police South Africa Police have discovered a multi-million dollar drug manufacturing facility on a farm in the north of the country and arrested four people, including two Mexican nationals.
The South African Police Service (SAPS) and the Priority Crimes Investigation Unit, known as the Hawks, searched a premises in the town of Groblersdal after receiving information that suspicious activity was taking place, the SAPS said in a statement.
Police searched four buildings on the site and found large quantities of chemicals used to make illegal drugs, including acetone and crystal meth, with an estimated street value of 2 billion South African rand ($109.4 million).
The farm owner and two Mexican nationals were among the four suspects detained on Friday, police said, adding that the Hawks were not ruling out further arrests.
“What makes it different from the others? [seizures] “It involves Mexican nationals,” Hawks national spokesman Katlego Mogale told Reuters, adding that it “means our task has become much more difficult.”
It is unclear whether the drugs seized were intended for the South African market or overseas.
Police said the suspects are due to appear at Groblersdal Magistrate’s Court on Monday on charges of manufacturing, dealing and possessing illegal drugs.
Some 131 drug dens have been shut down across the country since 2019, police said in January, adding that more than 19,000 people were arrested for drug possession during last year’s festive season.
According to the statement, so far this year, the Hawks have uncovered 10 clandestine drug factories and arrested 34 people as they continue their war on drugs in the country.
South Africa has the potential to become one of the “world’s largest methamphetamine consumption markets,” researchers from the Global Initiative against Transnational Organized Crime said in a report. 2021 Report.
It is also Explained Last year the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) designated it an “attractive drug transit country”, citing the country’s “porous borders”, as well as its geography and international trade links, as reasons for the country’s growing synthetic drug market.
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