Two Nigerians held in Lebanon for drug-peddling, cocaine ingestion
Lebanese police announced yesterday the arrest of two Nigerians who, in mid-August, smuggled cocaine capsules into Lebanon by ingesting them beforehand.
The two suspects, aged 59 and 34, brought the cocaine from Nigeria to Lebanon, transiting through Ethiopia, according to a statement from the Internal Security Forces (ISF).
Arriving in Beirut’s international airport at dawn on August 19, they initially planned to go to a hotel in the Metn region. However, they ended up choosing a hotel in the Hamra district of Beirut, where they extracted the drugs before handing them over to a dealer.
The suspects were arrested by police after delivering the merchandise, except for one capsule that was stuck in one of their intestines. The capsule was eventually removed in a surgery in Lebanon, “in order to save the suspect’s life,” police said. The other people involved in the trafficking have been identified and are being sought by the authorities.
Police also said they had arrested, “over a period of three months, four Nigerians, one Brazilian and one Lebanese” who were attempting to smuggle drugs into Lebanon
In mid-August, the ISF had already announced the arrest of two other Nigerians who, at the end of July, brought into Lebanon 156 capsules of pure cocaine that they had previously ingested, totaling 3.4 kg. On May 22, the ISF also arrested a man who arrived at Beirut’s airport from an African country, in possession of a large quantity of narcotics, both in his suitcases and in capsules he had swallowed beforehand
