KUALA LUMPUR – 76 teenagers were among the 5,200 drug addicts arrested during Op Tapis Khas (Special Screening Operation) launched by the Bukit Aman Narcotics Crime Investigation Department (NCID) nationwide.
Two of the teenagers were 13 years-old, meanwhile, the rest of them were between 14-18 years-old. Some of them were drug dealers.
10 of them were school students; Selangor (2), Kelantan (3), Pahang (2) and Negeri Sembilan (3), meanwhile, 66 others were dropouts, said the Bukit Aman NCID Director, Datuk Ayob Khan Mydin Pitchay.
According to him, the three-day concurrent special operation was conducted from 21 to 23 January throughout the country.
“We have successfully arrested and inspected 5,446 addicts in Op Tapis Khas. We arrested 5,200 individuals including 213 women between the age of 13 and 60 over various drug offences. Meanwhile, 129 were foreigners.
“According to the breakdown of the suspects, 942 were drug dealers, 2,893 were addicts, meanwhile, 201 were wanted individuals over various offences.
“Therefore, we also successfully seized various drugs amounting to 212.6 kilogramme and 1,199.2 litres of liquid drug worth RM3.587 million (RM3,587,324.35),” he said during a news conference today.
According to the breakdown, the types of drug confiscated by the NCID were heroin (5.01kg), syabu (30.2kg), ketamine (4.56kg), ganja (53.42kg), erimin pills (511.8 kg); yaba pills (1.57 kg), ecstasy powder (4.93 gram), ketum leaves (106.04 kg); psychotropic pills (31.40 gram), ketum water (974.74 litres) and cocaine liquid (224.47 litres).
According to Ayob Khan, the NCID also seized a revolver gun and three bullets from the drug suspect seized during an operation in Perak, a homemade rifle and four bullets in Sarawak and a homemade riffle in Negeri Sembilan.
Besides that, the NCID also confiscated various assets from the syndicates estimated at RM2.392 million; cash amounting to (RM333,766); jewelry (RM41,540); 34 cars (RM1.580 million); 69 motorcycles (RM391,700) and a lorry worth RM45,000.
He said, the objective of the special operation was to detect and arrest drug dealers, destroy the drug distribution ports, take actions on hardcore drug addicts, detect and arrest individuals wanted by the police over various offences and to take precautionary measures against dealers that have been identified.
They were investigated under Section 39B, 39A (2), 39A(1), Section 12(2), Section 6 and Section 39C of the Dangerous Drugs Act 1952, Section 30(3) Poison Act 1952 and Dangerous Drugs (Special Preventive Measures) Act 1985.
“After a discussion with the Home Minister, Datuk Seri Hamzah Zainudin and the Inspector-General of Police, Tan Sri Acryl Sani Abdullah Sani, the Op Tapis Khas will be carried out on a monthly basis after this,” he said.
According to Ayob Khan, the war against drugs is hoped to eradicate drugs threat more effectively among the community.
“I hope that the community will continue to cooperate by channeling information on drug distribution around them via the NCID hotline at 012-208 7222.
“We want to be consistent in carrying out operations. We don’t want to do it once in three or four months. The drug nests sometimes move around, thus, we need to carry out continuous operations,” he said.
2,696 members of the NCID were involved in the special operation and raided and destroyed 367 drug nests. Selangor had the most nests with 69 ports, followed by Sabah with 57 ports. -MalaysiaGazette
