US Sees Bulgaria as Key Drugs Producer
US Sees Bulgaria as Key Drugs Producer
19 09 2007 Sofia _ Apart from being a major point on the drugs transit route, Bulgaria is becoming an important producer of narcotics, a US State Department report has warned.
The trafficking of drugs, people and money remains a threat to Bulgaria due to its strategic location, according to the report on the world trade in narcotics in 2006.
Despite the Bulgarian government's repeated expressions of its commitment to combating serious crime, there have been no major drugs trafficking arrests to date.
Synthetic drugs, heroin, and cocaine are the main illegal substances transported through Bulgaria from Asia to drug users in western Europe, the State Department notes in its report released on Tuesday.
However, the Bulgarian authorities say heroin is now being smuggled through a longer route across the Caucasus and Russia.
Bulgarian-made synthetic drugs are illegally exported through Turkey to the markets of south-west Asia. In 2006, the Bulgarian authorities closed one illegal drug-producing laboratory, and seized 8,450 kg of drugs.
Petkan Iliev, an analyst at the Bulgarian Center for the Study of Democracy, argues that Bulgaria cannot be defined as a major centre of drug production. The amount of drugs produced in Bulgaria is not growing, but is decreasing, he says.
"Our studies indicate that synthetic drugs were produced in Bulgaria in earlier years as well," Iliev told Balkan Insight.
Bulgaria's Ministry of Internal Affairs did not comment on the US report. According to Interior Minister Rumen Petkov's latest report, four illegal laboratories for synthetic drugs were discovered in the last two years.
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