10,000 ecstasy pills recovered from Dutch parcel in Pakistan

RAWALPINDI: Anti Narcotics Force (ANF) has recovered 10,000 ecstasy pills, also known as methylenedioxymethamphetamine, from a parcel that arrived from Netherlands, ARY NEWS reported on Tuesday.

According to an ANF spokesman, the recovered drugs weighed around four and a half kilograms. “They were recovered from a parcel received from Netherlands after the staff of the courier company in Rawalpindi examined it,” they said.

The spokesman said that the ecstasy pills had to be smuggled from Rawalpindi to Peshawar. “We have registered a case into the matter and will probe regarding the senders and receivers of the parcel,” he said.

This is not the first time that a bid to smuggle ecstasy pills from Netherlands has been foiled as a similar attempt was unearthed and foiled by the International Mail Office (IMO) in March 2019.

The IMO said the 9-kilogram tablets were worth more than Rs70 million. The officials said they were to be sold to students of schools and colleges.

Ecstasy is an illegal drug that contains the active ingredient MDMA (3, 4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine). The IMO officials said one ecstasy tablet was sold for Rs3,500 to 4,000.

An IMO officer said the parcel dispatched from Netherlands was opened after it was suspected of containing suspicious elements. The official said the parcel was sent to a resident of Islamabad, Kashif Khan.