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US Navy intercepts boats full of drugs
Topic Started: Dec 21 2003, 07:59 PM (334 Views)
RBTiger
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US Navy intercepts boats full of drugs with potential al-Qaeda ties



WASHINGTON : The US Navy has intercepted and seized two small boats laden with illegal drugs in the northern Arabian Sea and is investigating whether they were part of a fund-raising operation of the al-Qaeda terror network, the military said Saturday.

"We are investigating potential al-Qaeda connections to these operations," Rear Admiral Jim Stavridis, commander of the Enterprise aircraft carrier strike group, said in a brief statement.

The seizure of the two boats, or dhows, marks the second major drug seizure in the Gulf area in less than a week as the United States steps up efforts to cut off all possible sources of terrorist financing.

The suspicious boats were first spotted by a maritime patrol aircraft from New Zealand on Thursday, according to the US Central Command.

For 48 hours, they had been tracked across the region by planes from that country as well as Australia, Britain and the United States.

Intelligence collected during those overflights led to an order to the guided-missile cruiser USS Philippine Sea to intercept the vessels, which was done in the North Arabian Sea at dawn Saturday.

A search of the first dhow by a US boarding party yielded approximately 67 kilogrammes of methamphetamines, the command said.

The second dhow attempted to flee while its crew members worked feverishly to dump their cargo into the sea, according to video footage released by the navy.

Some 200 white bags were thrown overboard during the chase, according to a tape made by a US P-3C Orion surveillance plane, which tracked the fleeing boat throughout.

When the dhow was finally caught and boarded, US sailors found two remaining bags containing 38 kilogrammes of a substance believed to be pure heroin with a street value of up to US$7.3 million.

A total of 21 crewmen from the vessels are currently in US Navy custody and are being questioned, according to the Central Command.

Their nationalities as well as the dhows' port of origin have not been disclosed.


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