Parcel from China labeled as food additives held 25 kg of pregabalin, customs says

Parcel from China labeled as food additives held 25 kg of pregabalin, customs says

Customs officers said they thwarted an attempt to establish a clandestine drug laboratory in Gulistan, in Sirdarya province.

Officers from the Tashkent-Aero specialized customs complex and the E-commerce foreign economic activity customs post inspected a courier parcel sent from China. The paperwork listed the contents as colored food additives, but the inspection uncovered a white crystalline powder, the committee said.

The Central Customs Laboratory determined that the parcel contained about 25 kilograms of pregabalin, a potent substance.

Customs officers, together with the State Security Service and internal affairs bodies, then conducted investigative operations. According to the committee, the parcel had been sent via a Telegram account called “Altair” to two Gulistan residents, who were detained in Tashkent while collecting it.

Searches at the suspects’ homes in Gulistan found 8,000 empty capsules, 300 handmade capsules, two electronic scales, five pairs of medical gloves and 5 kilograms of a substance resembling the narcotic mephedrone.

The committee said the suspects are men aged 20 and 21. It added that they operated through an online shop called “SIMBIOZ” selling narcotic substances, and that the operations also established they had tried to set up a clandestine drug laboratory.

Customs authorities have opened a criminal case.

Earlier, authorities reported finding more than 1,300 potent medicines in Tashkent and Bukhara.