SEOUL, Jul 15 (NNN-YONHAP) – Smuggled drugs caught by the South Korean authorities nearly tripled in the first half of the year, as contactless smuggling through international mail and express cargo jumped, amid the protracted COVID-19 pandemic, customs office data showed today.
Smuggled drugs, confiscated by the customs agency, reached 214.2 kg in the Jan-Jun period, up 153 percent from the same period last year, according to Korean Customs.
It came as the drug smuggling via contactless delivery means, such as international mail and express cargo, surged amid the prolonged pandemic, the customs, said.
The number of drug confiscation cases smuggled via the non-contact means jumped to 605, or about 91 percent of the total detected cases, in the first half of the year, from 158 tallied a year earlier.
The amount of confiscated methamphetamine spiked 77 percent over the year to 43.5 kg in the first half. It equals to drugs that can be administered to some 1.45 million people.
The number of spotted cases to smuggle MDMA, also known as ecstasy, and LSD roughly tripled in the six-month period, but the reading for hemp confiscation cases declined 10 percent, due to the falling number of travellers amid the pandemic.
The customs office said, international drug rings continued to smuggle over one kg of methamphetamine into South Korea in the first half, noting that drug trafficking from the western region of the United States was on the rise.
It added that, the cases increased for young people to purchase a small amount of drug via social media and dark web, that can be delivered through international mail and express cargo.
