Monday, 20 June 2011
A police officer discovers drugs stashed in bricks in Saudi Arabia. (File Photo)
Saudi authorities have arrested 503 people over the past three months for drug-related crimes and seized drugs worth more than 1.6 billion riyals ($427 million), the state news agency SPA said.
The confiscated drugs included amphetamines, hashish, heroin and the stimulant qat, SPA said, adding 251 of the people held were foreigners with 24 different nationalities.
“That is the figure for the people who were arrested but ... charges still have to be issued after the investigations are concluded,” Interior Ministry spokesman Mansour al-Turki told Reuters by telephone.
The confiscated drugs included amphetamines, hashish, heroin and the stimulant qat, SPA said, adding 251 of the people held were foreigners with 24 different nationalities.
“That is the figure for the people who were arrested but ... charges still have to be issued after the investigations are concluded,” Interior Ministry spokesman Mansour al-Turki told Reuters by telephone.
Saudi Arabia is an absolute monarchy that follows an austere version of Sunni Islam. The kingdom puts drug traffickers, as well as murderers and rapists, to death by public beheading and the authorities regularly report executions of Asian and African nationals convicted of drug smuggling.
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