Police in Indonesia’s resort island of Bali said on Tuesday they had arrested two South African nationals for drug trafficking in an operation described as the biggest heroin bust in two years.
Police found 2,3kg of the drug when they raided the hotel room where the two South Africans were staying last Tuesday, said Adjunct Commissioner Lennon, an officer in the Balinese capital of Denpasar.
The two suspects were identified as John Gabriele (37) and Martin Christopher (40).
Denpasar deputy police chief Dewa Parsana was quoted by Tuesday’s Jakarta Post as saying that the seizure of the drugs, which have a street value of two billion rupiah (about $215 000), was the biggest heroin bust since 2002.
Parsana said the arrest indicated that Bali, which in the 1980s was merely a stepping stone for dealers involved in the international narcotics trade, was now a drug market in its own right.
More than two dozen people, mostly foreigners, are on death row in Indonesia for drug offences. Rights group Amnesty International has said that at least 66 people are facing capital punishment in Indonesia.
Last month Indonesia carried out its first execution in three years when Indian national Ayodhya Prasad Chaubey, a convicted drug smuggler, was executed by a police firing squad in the North Sumatran city of Medan.
He was executed despite international appeals to spare his life.
President Megawati Sukarnoputri, who is battling for re-election against her former security minister, has recently refused clemency for 11 convicted drug traffickers, saying she had a duty to protect young people from narcotics. – Sapa-AFP