WESTERN BUREAU:
IN A move aimed at curtailing the activities of Jamaican drug smugglers, Customs officials in the United Kingdom say they will soon be installing a new neutron scanner, designed to scan mailbags arriving there from Jamaica.
This, they conceded, has become necessary in light of "an upsurge in the amount of cocaine that is being sent to the U.K. from Jamaica via the postal system."
Officials there have also pointed out that since the installing of hi-tech airport scanners, the frequency of drug mules travelling between the two countries have been significantly reduced.
U.K. Foreign Office Minister Bill Rammell told BBC Radio 4's Today programme in an interview last week that: "I think it's part of the solution. When you're dealing with the drugs industry, it's ingenious, it's illegal and well-re-sourced. "When you block off one route, they'll find another."
He noted that despite the success of efforts to stop people smuggling in cocaine themselves, supplies of cheap crack on the streets of the U.K. from the Caribbean has continued to rise.
He said that the U.K. police and customs officers have been detecting larger quantities in the post; either sent via airmail, or using fast parcel services, adding that nearly all crack cocaine on the streets of Bristol is estimated to have come from Jamaica and two large parcels were intercepted in January.
Detective Chief Inspector Neil Smart, in a separate interview with the BBC, said: "Something that has come to our attention is the increased use of the postal service and couriers and we've become very successful in intercepting those packages." He added that the Jamaican police have confirmed that "cocaine was often sent in envelopes, and up to four kilos had been found in courier parcels."
"Drug mules used to provide a way of sending cocaine to the U.K. cheaply and efficiently in person," he said. But measures, including scanners introduced at airports in Kingston and in Montego Bay, had contribute to the capture of smugglers."
He pointed out that in 2003, the number of cocaine couriers arrested in the U.K. had dropped by three-quarters, while the number arrested in Jamaica before boarding flights had doubled.
