Vietnamese border guards have arrested a Russian man for carrying 2.3kg of dried marijuana leaves from Laos to Vietnam via the border gate in the central Vietnamese province of Quang Tri.

>> Vietnam-Laos joint force busts drug ring, seizing 92 bricks of heroin Thirty-one-year-old Vladimir Shperling, of Russian nationality, was caught hiding the marijuana in his luggage when he was carrying out procedures to enter Vietnam from Laos at the province’s Lao Bao International Border Gate at 8:00 am on Friday. After checking its database on drug trafficking, the Lao Bao Border Guard Station discovered the foreigner had been hunted internationally by Interpol over the past ten years on charges of illegally transporting drugs. The local border guard force is carrying out formalities to hand the drug trafficker over to competent agencies. Another case of cross-border drug trafficking from Laos into Vietnam was uncovered in the central province of Nghe An on December 28, 2014. At noon that day, border guards at the Nam Can International Border Gate caught Ha Ba Cu, a 23-year-old local man, carrying 20 heroin bricks weighing about 7kg. Cu told investigators that he illegally crossed the border to enter Laos in 2011 and had lived in Lac Xao Town of Bolykhamsay Province since then.

He also joined a transnational trafficking ring that included many Laotians and other Vietnamese people.

The ring was well organized and operated in sophisticated manners, Cu said.  Under Vietnam’s Penal Code, those who are convicted of smuggling more than 2.5 kilograms of methamphetamine will be given a death sentence. The capital penalty is also applied to those who are found guilty of producing or selling 100 grams of heroin or 300 grams of other illegal narcotics.

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