Saudi anti-drug police have apprehended 14 individuals involved in drug trafficking and smuggling across various parts of the country.

The kingdom’s General Directorate of Narcotics Control reported the arrest of seven Bangladeshi residents in Riyadh for dealing in 3.3 kg of methamphetamine, 12,432 amphetamine tablets, and an unspecified amount of hashish.

In Jeddah, two Syrian nationals and a Saudi citizen were arrested for peddling 21,000 amphetamine tablets.

In a separate raid, an expatriate and a Saudi citizen were detained in Medina for dealing in 75,600 amphetamine tablets. Additionally, border guard patrols in the south-western region of Jizan apprehended two Ethiopian nationals for attempting to smuggle 40 kg of the illicit qat stimulant.

Saudi Arabia has intensified its crackdown on narcotics smugglers and traffickers in recent months, as part of its “war on drugs,” reporting numerous foiled attempts.

Earlier this month, the Saudi Zakat, Tax, and Customs Authority (Zatca) announced that customs inspectors at Jeddah port had foiled an attempt to smuggle 3,633,978 captagon pills hidden in a shipment.

In May, Saudi anti-drug police seized 4.7 million amphetamine tablets hidden in a consignment of concrete blocks and arrested two foreigners in connection with the haul.

That same month, customs authorities thwarted an attempt to smuggle cocaine into the kingdom in a potato shipment arriving at Jeddah port. Drug smuggling and trafficking in Saudi Arabia are offenses punishable by up to death.