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| Sunday, 8 September 2002 |
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Police Kennel Div. to train Maldivian mates by JAYAMPATHY JAYASINGHE For the first time the Sri Lanka Police Department will sign an agreement with the Maldivian Police Department somewhere next month to train dog handlers and sniffer dogs in the archipelago to detect drug trafficking, Acting IGP, T. E. Anandarajah told the "Sunday Observer." He said the Police will help train the Maldivian authorities to set up a kennel there. Initially two sniffer dogs with two experienced dog handlers from the Police Department will be sent to the Maldives, after the agreement was signed, he said." The Maldivian Police Commissioner Brigadier Adam Zahir who was in Sri Lanka last week met the Interior Minister John Amaratunga, Secretary Interior Ministry, M. A. Junaid and the acting IGP to finalise the agreement. The Maldivian Government had requested for the Sri Lankan expertise to tackle the drug trafficking which had become a serious problem. Brig. Adam Zahir said although the Maldivian population was around 300,000 several youth were now getting hooked on drugs and the government was very much concerned about it despite several drugs awareness programs. Earlier the Drug Enforcement Authority (DEA) of the United States and the Sri Lanka Police Narcotics Bureau (PNB) had trained a batch of Maldivian Police officers in drug detection work a few years back. PNB sources said that heroin mainly, the brown sugar variety from India was smuggled in via Sri Lanka by couriers despite stringent laws in Maldives which prohibit the use of drugs. However only small quantities of heroin have been detected so far during the past few years. Heroin smuggling has become a lucrative business in the Maldives with the heavy influx of tourists to the country. |
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