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Ammon News - Jordan is fighting an extenuating drug problem from its surrounding regions, and especially its northern borders that connect it with Syria. The fight is tooth and nail. The army are on full alert guarding its long 362-kilometer border with Syria at a judicious pace by stopping smugglers and traffickers. But it’s a long, hard slog that may not end anytime soon.

The narcotics problem has become acute and pernicious in Jordan in 2022 from the official statistics made available. Today, the Kingdom through its security forces and its army is fighting the spread of drugs through taking drastic actions. The smugglers came armed with heavy weapons and as a result the army defends itself.

Last month Jordan's Minister of Interior Mazen Farrayeh was in a somber mood, saying the Kingdom seized more than three tons of Hashish in the first eight months of 2022, that is more than half a ton on the previous year. Further, he added the security forces also captured 36 kilos of heroin whereas it was only a kilo in 2021. But its still early days because the success of capture if it can be called that, will not be gauged till the end of this year and the beginning of 2023.

Since the beginning of this year Jordan's army took it upon themselves to protect the Kingdom's borders from the drugs and sometimes weapons smugglers try to bring into the country. Indeed, the year opened with them taking a high profiled and militaristic approach to the problem of smuggling narcotics into the Kingdom.

At the end of last January and after and armed clash with machine guns and rifles, it managed to kill 27 of these drug traffickers on the border. According to different reports it was a bloody battle. The smugglers were backed by armed groups and some of those engaged just went back inside the Syrian territories which means the battle on the northern front was indeed a major one turning into military skirmishes.

For Jordanian security forces this was only the beginning since it happened in the first month of the year. Throughout the following months there was numerous attempts to smuggle drugs into the country with similar battles occurring between the traffickers and the army. Some of these traffickers are shot, some arrested and others run away and/or go back into the Syrian depth.

As well, and the armed actions aside, at times the Jordanian authorities capture and arrests smugglers, with these being the case recently last month in August. Then the authorities arrested 28 people in the north-eastern borders suspected of trafficking as well as seizing 23 vehicles and firearms. All these impounded.
By: Marwan Amar/ALbawaba