Assad at the head of Captagon's traffic in the Middle East

Bashar al-Assad developed the industrial production of this amphetamine in Syria, in order to circumvent international sanctions and consolidate its allegiance networks.

Lot of Captagon intercepted in Saudi Arabia aboard Fruits imported from Lebanon (photo broadcast on April 23, 2021 by the Saudi news agency)

Crimes against humanity, war crimes, organized massacres, systematic rapes, forced disappearance campaigns, expulsion of whole populations, the list is long of crimes already attributed to Bashar al-Assad.Convinced of his impunity, the Syrian dictator has now added the offense of massive production and aggressive marketing of narcotics.Syrian territory under the control of the ASSAD regime has indeed become the main production area of Captagon, an amphetamine of which Saudi Arabia constitutes the world's leading market.It is then the networks affiliated to the Assad regime which, especially from Lebanon, are responsible for transporting the cargoes from this drug to the Arabian peninsula.

The "two croissants"

When Hafez al-Assad sends his army to occupy a good part of Lebanon in 1976, he wasted no time in taking his tithe from the already flourishing hashish in the Lebanese plain of Békaa, then he encourages the development of the culture of the poppy.Laboratories of transformation into heroine of opium thus produced locally are installed under the control of the Syrian occupation army.The barons of the Assad regime which manage this traffic with great profit recruit for this purpose gangsters, nicknamed Chabbiha, the "ghosts" in Syria, the "ghosts".General Ali Douba, patron of military intelligence, is at the head of this de facto cartel, before being marginalized by Bashar al-Assad, who succeeds his father Hafez, in 2000, as the absolute master of Syria.The withdrawal of the Syrian contingent of Lebanon in 2005, under popular pressure, completes to close this first mafia cycle of the Syrian dictatorship.

A second cycle has opened up for a few years, this time on Syrian territory under the control of the Assad regime.In this case, the supply has been adjusted to the very strong demand of Captagon in Saudi Arabia, where the popularity of this amphetamine cannot be denied.This synthesis doping, initially based on fénétylline, is designated under the term of "father of the two croissants" (Abu al-Hilâlayn), because of the two crosses which constitute the trademark.The descent into hell militiamen of Syria was accompanied by the flowering of local manufacturing workshops of Captagon, first to provide the combatants with artificial stimulants, then to ensure a resource in foreign currency for local forces.It is in this context that the Daesh jihadists have developed their own Captagon factory, broadcast in smuggling either to Turkey or to the pro-Assad areas.But the territorial reconquest of the Assad regime, with the major aid of Russian aviation and, on the ground, pro-Iranian militias, poses it today as an undisputed Captagon on a regional scale.

Maher al-Assad at the controls

The international sanctions that strike the Assad regime have pushed it to a proactive policy of production and marketing of Captagon.Operational responsibility comes back to the president's younger brother, General Maher al-Assad, head of the fourth division, the Praetorian Guard of the regime, already involved in many killings and abuses.Captagon's production workshops are protected by Syrian soldiers in uniform, or even installed in the military zone in restricted access.The tight network of dams of the fourth division throughout the territory under control of the ASSAD regime allows the fluid circulation of amphetamine cargoes.A survey published last month by the "New York Times" designates two notorious war profiteers as the main "civilian" relays of such a traffic: one, Amer Khiti, was rewarded for his loyal service by a headquartersdeputy during the legislative "elections" of July 2020;The other, Khodr Taher, was, in the same spirit, decorated by President Assad of the Order of Merit.

This mafia retraining allowed Bashar al-Assad, firmly supported by his brother Maher, to manage the tensions that recently rocked the ruling circle, with the ambitions displayed by the "First Lady", Asma al-Assad, and the unprecedented slingfrom Ibrahim Makhlouf, cousin of the Head of State.The already intimate links between the Syrian dictatorship and the Lebanese Hezbollah have been further reinforced by the need to export from Lebanon the Captagon intended for Saudi Arabia.This, exasperated by the growing number of seizures of amphetamine, camouflaged in fruits and vegetables from Lebanon, decided, last April, an embargo on agricultural imports of this country.The Syrian regime then fell back on the Jordanian border which, as soon as it was reopened in August 2021, was the scene of attempts to infiltrate major charges of Captagon.A drone loaded with amphetamines was even shot down when it came out of Syrian space.And, last Sunday, a Jordanian officer was killed in a hanging with Syrian traffickers.Jordanian authorities believe that a fifth of drugs intended for Saudi Arabia could be consumed in Jordan during transit, a catastrophic perspective for a country hitherto spared by narcotics.

It would obviously be more necessary to dissuade the Assad regime from continuing, or even intensifying such a juicy traffic.The Syrian despot can in any case boast of having transformed his country into the first narco-state worthy of the name in the Middle East.