UN police make huge heroin bust in Kosovo
Agence France Presse - October 15, 2003

PRISTINA, Serbia-Montenegro - Three people have been arrested for trying to smuggle 36 kilograms (79.2 pounds) of heroin into Kosovo from neighbouring Albania, United Nations police said Wednesday

The arrest was made last week when border police stopped a vehicle bearing Austrian registration plates for a routine check in western Kosovo, UN police spokesman Derek Chappell told AFP.

"Concealed within the body of the car were found numerous packets containing a material that preliminary tests have identified as heroin," Chappel said.

Two of the suspects were from Albania and one was an ethnic-Albanian from Kosovo.

Chappell said the street value of the drugs in Western Europe was 1.5 million euros (1.8 million dollars), making it the largest heroin seizure in Kosovo since the province came under UN administration after the 1998-99 war.

In July UN police in eastern Kosovo seized 18 kilograms of heroin, valued at some 800,000 euros.

Copyright 2003 Agence France Presse
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