Tag: drugs

It may not be legal to purchase or smoke marijuana in North Korea, but the North Koreans are well known for smuggling drugs into other countries to raise foreign currency.

North Korea has been getting some pretty high praise lately from the stoner world.

Marijuana news outlets including High Times, Merry Jane and Green Rush — along with British tabloids, which always love a good yarn — are hailing the North as a pothead paradise and maybe even the next Amsterdam of pot tourism. They’ve reported North Korean marijuana to be legal, abundant and mind-blowingly cheap, sold openly to Chinese and Russian tourists at a major market on the North’s border for about $3 a pound.

But seriously, North Korea? Baked?

The claim that marijuana is legal in North Korea is not true: The penal code lists it as a controlled substance in the same category as cocaine and heroin. And the person who would likely help any American charged with a crime in North Korea emphatically rejects the idea that the ban is not enforced.

“There should be no doubt that drugs, including marijuana, are illegal here,” said Torkel Stiernlof, the Swedish ambassador. The United States has no diplomatic relations with the North, so Sweden’s embassy acts as a middleman when U.S. citizens run afoul of North Korean laws.

“One can’t buy it legally and it would be a criminal offense to smoke it,” Stiernlof said. He said that if a foreigner caught violating drug laws in North Korea happened to be an American citizen, he or she could “expect no leniency whatsoever.”  [ABC News]

You can read more at the link.

A British DJ has been arrested for drug smuggling in Korea:

A Grammy-nominated British DJ was arrested in Korea for alleged drug smuggling, police said Thursday.

Video footage shows him at a customs checkpoint at Incheon International Airport with a 1.5-liter bottle filled with an alleged illegal drug, they said.

Sources said he was Mark Lewis. Lewis, 52, was nominated for a Grammy Award in 2005 in the category of Best Electronic/Dance Album for “I Found U” that he produced.

Sources said Lewis allegedly smuggled 3.78 liters of gamma hydroxybutyrate (GHB), also known as the date rape drug, into Korea four times from January to June. The value is estimated at 370 million won ($340,000) and the quantity enough to dose 1,000 people. [Korea Times]

You can read more at the link.

How would you like to be the commander for the unit this guy belongs to?:

A U.S. Army sergeant stationed at Fort Bliss wore a military uniform bearing his name while allegedly selling methamphetamine to an undercover federal agent in El Paso earlier this year, court documents state.

Sgt. Derek Calderon, 25, who posted a video of himself with a stack of hundred dollar bills on social media, was arrested in connection with the meth trafficking scheme, according to the documents.

Calderon was indicted in a South Florida federal court on June 30 on one count of conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute 500 grams or more and two counts of possession with intent to distribute 50 grams or more, according to the indictment. He is facing life in prison on all three charges.  [El Paso Times]

You can read more at the link, but my favorite part of the article is that not only did this guy conduct a drug deal in uniform, but then he posted the money he received after the deal on Instagram for everyone to see.

This drug bust sure isn’t going to help the already poor image that many South Koreans hold of North Korean defectors living in South Korea.  Of interest is that apparently much of the meth was used by other North Korean defectors which is an indication of the large drug problem in North Korea that has been reported on before.  Just think after unification South Korea will have to deal with an entire country that could be hooked on drugs:

A group of more than 20 North Korean defectors and ethnic Korean-Chinese people have been indicted here on charges of smuggling methamphetamine believed to be produced in the North into South Korea for sale or personal consumption, South Korean prosecutors said on Sunday, noting they have found circumstantial evidence of North Korean residents’ involvement in the crime.

 

The Seoul Central District Prosecutors’ Office said it has indicted a total of 23 suspects, including North Korean defectors living here and ethnic Koreans in China, with or without detention for smuggling the illegal drug into South Korea and seized about 810.7 grams of meth, or 27,000 doses. Meth, which can trigger side effects such as paranoia, hallucinations, delirium and delusions, is banned in South Korea.

 

All told, 16 North Korean defectors were referred to trial.  [Yonhap]

You can read the rest at the link.

The article doesn’t say if the person was a government civilian or contractor, but regardless he has been fired for having ecstasy pills mailed to him in South Korea:

An American civilian who worked at the U.S. military in South Korea has been indicted on charges of trafficking drugs to Yongsan Garrison in central Seoul, prosecutors said Friday.

The Seoul Central District Prosecutors’ Office said the 35-year-old, identified only by his initial J, is suspected of receiving 35 pills of MDMA, better known as “ecstasy,” and 20.5 grams of hemp from an unidentified seller last year.

Still, the suspect was not taken into custody.

The drugs were sent from the Netherlands and went through the distribution center for military posts at Incheon International Airport, Seoul’s main gateway, before arriving at the military base, prosecutors said.

The suspect, who worked with the 8th U.S. Army, was fired in September after being caught by South Korean police who received a tip from the U.S. military’s criminal investigation division.  [Yonhap]

S. Korean swimmer Park Tae-hwan fails drug test http://t.co/qhSFSqiBGt #ParkTaeHwan

— The Korea Times (@koreatimes) January 26, 2015

It seems like smuggling drugs is risky enough, but to smuggle them into a country that will not hesitate to kill you just seems stupid:

China executed a South Korean national last week for smuggling and trading drugs, Seoul’s foreign ministry said Monday, following Beijing’s execution of three South Korean drug dealers five months earlier.

Despite Seoul’s repeated pleas for clemency, the Chinese authorities on Tuesday executed the South Korean national, identified only by his surname Kim, who was sentenced to death for drug smuggling and transportation in China, the ministry said.

Kim was arrested in China in May 2010 on charges of smuggling some 5 kilograms of drugs into the country and trafficking them.

A Chinese district court sentenced him to death in April 2012 and an appellate court upheld the ruling eight months later. China’s highest court also confirmed the sentence.

Seoul’s foreign ministry expressed regret over China’s execution of the South Korean national despite its repeated calls for clemency.

“The Korean government regrets that the execution took place although Seoul had requested Beijing to refrain from handing carrying it out on humanitarian grounds and the principle of reciprocity,” the foreign ministry said. “We plan to beef up cooperation with related countries to prevent Korean nationals from being involved in drug-related crime.”  [Yonhap]

You can read more at the link.

I guess this helps explain the increase in the USFK drug abuse numbers:

Three illegal foreign nationals tried to sell methamphetamine to an undercover Army investigator and were arrested by South Korean police in Dongducheon last week, officials said Tuesday.

A Criminal Investigation Command special agent posed as a U.S. servicemember a few blocks from Camp Casey’s main gate during a June 19 joint sting operation with local police, a Yangju police official said Tuesday.

The investigator offered to buy a half-gram of methamphetamine for $500 from the three women in the Bosandong bar district known as “The Ville.”

They arrested three Philippines nationals, ages 21, 28 and 31, whose names were not immediately available. Each of the women was in the country illegally and has no relation to U.S. Forces Korea, officials said.  [Stars & Stripes]

The juicies in TDC have been taking drugs for years so the fact they are selling them isn’t surprising.  The fact they were in the country illegally as well isn’t surprising either.  You can read more over at Nomad.