Nigerian 300,000 drug smugglers caught at VIA
Custom officials have arrested two drug couriers trying to smuggle illegal substances worth 300,000 into Austria.Police said today (Tues) that two Nigerians were arrested after Vienna International Airport (VIA) officers discovered 2.7 kilograms of heroin and cocaine inside their bodies and weaved into their underwear.The men aged 37 and 35 arrived at Austrias biggest airport on flights from the Netherlands last week. One of them lived in London, Great Britain, while the other suspect was identified as a resident of the Hungarian capital Budapest. Police are currently trying to find out whether the men knew each other and if they were part of an internationally operating drug smuggling organisation.Both men travelled on their own and claimed financial difficulties tempted them to trying to smuggle the illegal substances into Austria. The discovered drugs had a street sale value of around 300,000 Euros, according to police.X-rays carried out after smear tests on the mens hands showed that the older trafficker carried five sealed plastic bags containing around 900 grams of heroin and more than 200 grams of cocaine inside his stomach. Police also found small drug capsules hidden in the cloth of a womens camisole he wore over his underpants.An officer stressed that the man would have died had just one of the packages burst.The 35-year-old, who landed in Vienna two days later, had 83 drug capsules containing around 1.5 kilograms of cocaine hidden inside the fabric of his clothes.Only last May, VIA custom staff caught a 35-year-old Spanish woman, a 25-year-old Spaniard and a 31-year-old man from the USA trying to smuggle an overall 1.7 kilograms of cocaine and 500 grams of heroin worth around 600,000 Euros into Austria.Meanwhile, the Austrian Institute for Health announced that 26 per cent of Austrians aged between 20 and 24 had tried cannabis, LSD or other drugs at least once.The authority explained marijuana had the highest consumption rate among young adults since 30 to 40 per cent smoked cannabis at least once in their lives, while fewer than two per cent took heroin.The institute also announced that 187 people died as a result of taking drugs last year, up from 169 in 2008. It stressed that the actual number of drug deaths might be higher since fewer autopsies have been carried out during the past years than in previous decades for various reasons.