NDEA communiqué - NDEA seizes 32kg of heroin, two to appear in court today |23 March 2015

Two Seychellois are to appear in court today after being taken into custody on Saturday after the National Drugs Enforcement Agency seized 32 kilograms of heroin with a street value of R112 million in the La Misère area.

In a communiqué, the National Drugs Enforcement Agency (NDEA) writes that in line with its operations targeting known drug importers and distributers the agency in a planned operation seized 32 kilograms of heroin with a street value of R112 million (approximately US $8 million) in the La Misère area in the afternoon of Saturday March 21,

Two persons – one male and one female – have been taken into custody following the seizure and will appear in court today, adds the communiqué.
The NDEA said it expects to make further arrests in the coming week.

It is believed that the drugs arrived in the country in recent days and the seizure represents the biggest seizure of drugs in the history of Seychelles.
This seizure has dealt a severe blow to a major criminal drug cartel, adds the communiqué.

An investigation has been launched into all the circumstances surrounding the importation and further arrests are anticipated.

Speaking to the Seychelles News Agency, NDEA’s deputy chief officer Liam Quinn said the drugs which had “arrived in the country in recent days” were seized in “an open area” at Souvenir, La Misère.

“This was in an operation that has been ongoing for some time and the NDEA basically mounted a surveillance operation on the basis of information and intelligence gathered by the agency over a period of time and this resulted in the interception of the drugs,” he said.

Mr Quinn also told the Seychelles News Agency the seizure equates to about 10 times the amount of heroin seized by the NDEA in a normal year.