The Bhutanese Leading the way.
Brown sugar or heroin cases are coming up recently. While the country has dealt with controlled substances such as marijuana and pharmaceutical drugs, the emerging attempts of smuggling hard drugs is a concerning shift in the ongoing struggle against drug-related challenges.
From December to February, three heroin smuggling attempts have been made, seizing a total of 31.43 kg of the illicit contrabands.
The quantity of heroin seized has also increased significantly.
In the most recent case on 4th February 2025 a 37-year-old Indian man was apprehended with 17.1 kg of heroin. This is the largest seizure till date.
On 8th January 2025, a 28-year-old Indian national was apprehended at the Paro International Airport after being caught with 9.73 kg of heroin.
On 22nd December 2024, a 50-year-old Indian national was caught smuggling 4.6 kg of heroin the Paro International Airport.
In all the cases, the suspects were traveling on a flight from Bangkok to Paro. The heroin consignments had passed undetected through three international airports, Laos, Vietnam, and Thailand.
Crime and Operation Department, Royal Bhutan Police (RBP) shared that in all the cases suspects were middle men responsible for the package transportation, and the main person might be someone else as they confessed that the package was to be delivered to someone in India.
RBP said that it seems our country is being used as transit because there is no big market for such hard drugs.
Further, a 43-year-old man from Haa has been arrested by Chinese border officers in an attempt to smuggle a consignment of brown sugar into Tibet on in December 2024.
RBP said that around 20 cases related to hard drug smuggling have been reported so far.
As per RBP’s statistics 47.88 kgs of brown sugar have been seized in 2024 compared to 0.36 grams seized in 2023.
One of the most alarming findings is the drastic rise in brown sugar (heroin) seizures, surging from 0.36 grams in 2023 to 47.88 kg in 2024.
Seizures of cannabis leaves saw a slight drop from 14.97 kg in 2023 to 13.15 kg in 2024, while hashish (resin) seizures also declined from 1.91 kg to 1.26 kg.
However, a significant development was the seizure of 337 cannabis plants in 2024, compared to zero in 2023.
The seizure of correction fluid diluters (used as inhalants) doubled, rising from 12 bottles/pens in 2023 to 24 in 2024. However, dendrite (a commonly abused adhesive solvent) seizures dropped to zero, compared to 550 grams in 2023.
Similarly, thinner seizures fell sharply from 148.01 liters to 42.23 liters.
Seizures of pharmaceutical drugs, particularly Spasmo Proxyvon Plus (SP+), saw a significant decrease from 243,849 capsules in 2023 to 155,994 in 2024.
Similarly, Nitrosun seizures fell from 2,401 to 1,015 tablets, and Corex/Recordex (cough syrup bottles) dropped from 203 to 172 bottles.
