UAE | Crime
Foreign missions urged to caution citizens on drugs
The Chief Prosecutor has called on diplomatic missions to warn their citizens about the UAE's zero-tolerance against drug criminals.
- By Bassam Za'za',Senior Reporter
- Published: 23:35 December 4, 2008
Dubai: The Chief Prosecutor has called on diplomatic missions to warn their citizens about the UAE's zero-tolerance against drug criminals.
The call comes from Chief Prosecutor Mohammad Ali Rustom who heads Bur Dubai's Second Public Prosecution, in light of what he described as "an ongoing practice of smuggling drug capsules in suspects' intestines or stomachs".
"Diplomatic missions have always [played] and should play an instructive and cautionary role through warning their citizens against carrying illegal substances to the UAE which has stern drug laws. Smuggling drug capsules in intestines or stomachs cannot be categorised as a growing phenomenon... however, I may describe it as an ongoing unlawful practice by many visitors who are often exposed attempting to smuggle drug capsules in their intestines," Rustom told Gulf News.
The Head of Bur Dubai's Second Public Prosecution (the jurisdiction of which also includes Dubai International Airport) called on foreign consulates to enlighten their citizens and caution them against carrying any sort of banned substances, especially drugs, and to respect UAE laws.
Swallowing capsules
"Even if the substance is allowed in the citizen's country that doesn't hold the visitor any right to carry it into the UAE which has zero tolerance to drug smugglers and peddlers. That's why we constantly ask the court to implement the toughest punishments applicable against drug criminals," stressed Rustom.
His warning comes in light of nearly two dozen cases (of visitors smuggling drug capsules in their intestines) which surfaced at the Dubai Courts of First Instance during the past six weeks.
Recently, two Ghanaian visitors admitted that they smuggled in their intestines nearly 3.6 kilograms in 212 cocaine capsules which they claimed they intended to export to China.
The 46-year-old visitor, M.R., and his 43-year-old compatriot S.M. told the court that they smuggled capsules in their stomachs without knowing its content. One of them told the judge: "I did smuggle the capsules but I didn't know what they contained... I was supposed to take them to China as we came to Dubai as transit passengers."
An anti-narcotics corporal exposed the suspects as soon as they arrived at the arrivals terminal. "They seemed exhausted and so I took them for examination at the body-scanner which uncovered the strange objects in their intestines," claimed the corporal.
When asked why often in such cases does the Court of First Instance sentence the suspects to ten years in jail and a Dh50,000 fine followed by deportation, Rustom explained: "The Appeal's Public Prosecution often appeals the primary verdicts and asks the higher court to stiffen the punishment which, according to Federal Penal Code, goes up to a death sentence."
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