HALF-TON OF DRUGS

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 831, 27 November 1929, Page 6

HALF-TON OF DRUGS

IMPORTER MAKES PROFIT OF £130,000

TRAFFIC IN CAIRO In a remarkable report on the amazing extent of the drug traffic in Egypt, Russell Pasha, Commandant of the Cairo City Police, stated that a certain Armenian drug dealer in Cairo had imported 600 kilogrammes (over half a ton) of heroin during two years, writes a special correspondent of the “Daily Mail.” The wholesale price of that quantity was £50,000, and by retailing it at £3OO a kilogram the dealer made a profit of £130,000. Some surprise is expressed in Cairo newspapers that Russell Pasha has not had the arch-smuggler arrested and tried. The correspondent learns that this was done, after the period covered by Russell Pasha’s report, and that the man was sentenced to two years in prison and to pay a fine of £SOO. He appealed against this stiff but deserved sentence, but judgment went against him, and he is now serving his term of imprisonment. It is hoped that this case will have a salutary effect ill reducing the appalling extent of the drug traflic in Egypt, where its ravages are greater than in any other country, and where an important centre of the deadly trade for Europe and the East is to be found.