After a few months of investigation, police in northern Quang Tri Province have caught a businessman receiving 8 packets of heroin weighing 2.934 kilograms hidden in a wooden bed carried in by a bus from Laos.
Dau Xuan Duyen, 53, temporarily residing in Vinh city, Nghe An Province, was arrested Thursday morning on National Highway 9D in Dong Luong Ward, Dong Ha Town, where the bus with a Lao number plate stopped and delivered the bed to him.
The arrest was made following a tip-off from the public that had prompted the police to launch an investigation into a ring trafficking drug from Laos to Vietnam, said Lieutenant Colonel Ha Trong Hoan, deputy head of the Anti-Drug Police Department under the provincial Border Guard Command.
Duyen confessed to the police that he had bought the heroin from Laos hid it into the bed. Before returning to Vietnam, he hired the bus to carry the bed into Quang Tri through the Lao Bao border gate, Duyen said.
Duyen was suspected to be the leader of a ring trafficking drug and heroin from Laos to Vietnam, Hoan said, adding that the ring operated on a large scale, covering many provinces and cities across the country.
The seizure was one of the achievements of the cooperation program between Quang Tri and some Lao provinces on fighting drug trafficking, the official said.
Duyen, a native of Ha Tinh province, is director of a private company operating in the field of hospitality and tourism in Lien Chieu District, Da Nang City, according to police.
Since June 1, the provincial police have cracked down on 14 drug trafficking cases, arresting 29 people, seven of whom are Lao citizens, and seizing 8 packets of heroines, 24,851 WY synthetic drug tablets, three cars, a K59 gun, and some other items.
