Govt urged to review drugs policy
DRUG arrests are on the increase but the head of the Prime Ministry Anti-Drugs Commission, Hasan Karaokçu, and Democrat Party leader and Deputy Prime Minister Serdar Denktaş have called for a rethink on national policy.
Court statistics until 2016 — the last year for which they are available — show a steady rise for drug offences, with 432 cases heard that year, compared with 360 in 2014. Mr Karaokçu said: “I am working on the 2017 statistics now which are even higher and will have figures next week.”
However, speaking as Gazimağusa Assizes Court yesterday handed down record 10- and 11-year sentences against Ersin Dilmen and Duran Gül for smuggling Ecstasy and cocaine into the country hidden in a lorry, he said convictions were not the entire picture.
Mr Karaokçu said the use of
dangerous synthetic cannabis, known as Bonzai, which has caused 15 deaths since 2014, seemed to be down, and commented: “Arrests are on the increase, it is true, but usually only for small amounts as the police are under pressure to deal with the problem.”
The anti-drugs campaigner added: “I believe that sending 17- and 18-year-olds to prison is traumatic, and suspects are being oppressed and tortured in police stations to give so-called voluntary statements.
“We campaign in schools and want rehabilitation-focused programmes.”
Meanwhile Mr Denktaş had called for “realistic” and “informed” policy on recreational drugs and medical marijuana on local TV in the run-up to this month’s general election and labelled zero-tolerance supporters as “isolated and behind the times”.
Mr Karaokçu said: “Mr Denktaş and I had meetings a year ago for a new approach including the possibility of using a Germanmade saliva drug test for drivers and in the prison.”
South Cyprus last week announced the launch of saliva testing for motorists — for cannabis, cocaine, opoids, amphetamines and methamphetamines — which will be fully enforced from Thursday. There will be fines of up to 3,500 euros and three years’ imprisonment for positive testing or refusal.
The TRNC’s latest drug arrests, this week, included that of Geçitkale driver Mustafa Topcuoğlu, who was found unconscious in his crashed car and in possession of one gramme of an alleged illegal substance.
He claimed Fatih Esergül was his supplier, and Esergül was found with 167 paper wrappers and 74 grammes of a substance in the boot of his car which he claimed was the Cypriot vegetable molohiya, saying he “kept in his car as he liked the smell”.
A Dikmen man was also arrested with two grammes of a substance alleged to be Bonsai and a half-burned “joint”.
Israeli tourist Danny Arie and Turkish visitor Caner Alkoç were remanded to prison for not more than 20 and 25 days respectively last Friday after sniffer dogs at Ercan airport allegedly detected cannabis in their possession.
Last year saw police target dealers, with drug busts yielding thousands of Ecstasy pills hidden in a Girne cemetery, 380 grammes of Bonzai and a kilo of cannabis unearthed at the Boğazköy picnic area — earning those involved sentences of up to 15 years.
Mr Karaokçu’s own 23-year-old son was arrested last April among a quartet of friends at the Lokmacı border crossing allegedly in possession of 29 grammes of cannabis and is now awaiting a court hearing.
Border drug smuggling and cultivation arrests spiked last year, including foreign students and Greek Cypriots, and numbers of Turkish Cypriots imprisoned for drugs exceeded those of Turkish nationals in 2013 and 2014.
Mr Karaokçu commented: “We have not accepted the charges against my son. I have also been threatened because of my drugs campaign and believe he was targeted.
“Suspects are arrested and isolated, the family is not notified by the police, nor are suspects interviewed in the presence of a lawyer.”
Two British nationals were among those taken in recently during drugs swoops, with one of them remanded to prison custody pending trial. A spokesman for the British High Commission said they were not aware of the Christmas Eve arrests, adding: “We warn that the island is zero tolerant on drugs at www.gov.uk/foreign-travel-advice. We have never been notified of arrests of British nationals by the North Cyprus police, although they should [do so], and the Republic of Cyprus do.”
Delays at court have been compounded by problems with analysis of suspicious substances since a December 2016 fire at the State Laboratory destroyed expensive equipment.
Kemal Deniz Dana, undersecretary at the Health Ministry, said yesterday: “The government laboratory is able to analyse illegal drugs evidence but we have not yet obtained the equipment to test blood or urine samples from drug users, which has been delayed due to the elections.”