Kuwait foils bid by air traveller to smuggle in drug-laced paper sheets

Kuwait's international airport authorities have thwarted an attempt to smuggle a significant quantity of a narcotic substance concealed within A4-sized sheets of paper, according to the General Administration of Customs. The smuggling attempt was detected during a routine luggage scan, prompting further examination that revealed 1,603 A4-sized sheets, each weighing 13.154kg when saturated with the drug.

The customs authority described the narcotic substance as a chemical, though the exact nature of the drug remained undisclosed. The French national passenger, who had arrived from London on a visitor's visa, was subsequently handed over to the General Administration for Combating Drugs and Alcohol along with the seized narcotics.

This particular seizure follows closely on the heels of Kuwait's announcement of its largest drug bust to date, where nearly $500 million worth of Lyrica, a prescription medicine primarily used to treat nerve pain and epilepsy, as well as generalized anxiety disorders, was seized. The smuggled quantity included five tonnes of Lyrica powder and nearly four million capsules, ready for distribution, as per Sheikh Fahad Al Yousef, the First Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Interior.