President Ranil Wickremesinghe’s attention has been directed to establish a specialized task force to tackle the distribution of narcotics, especially among school children, State Minister of Defence Premitha Bandara Tennakoon said.
Speaking to the media yesterday (01), he said the task force will be established to implement the laws against those engaged in drug peddling and the distribution of narcotics across the country.
“The laws of Singapore have severe punishments for those engaged in drug peddling. The security forces in Singapore are also vested with powers to take necessary actions with regard to drug offences. We are also looking at creating similar laws and granting similar powers to the proposed Special Task Force,” he said.
Meanwhile, Ministry of Public Security Secretary S. Hettiarachchi said measures will be taken to remove the Police Special Task Force (STF) from other duties and deploy them on operations to tackle narcotics and organized crime-related activities.
Participating in the International Symposium on drug-related studies 2022, he said that according to current data there is a high distribution of narcotics in the Western and Southern Provinces.
“There are also reports of drug distribution spreading in the Kurunegala and Anuradhapura districts as well. We are also looking at conducting awareness programmes for Police officers and school authorities on this matter,” he said.
Stating that international channels and underworld figures were behind the distribution of drugs, Hettiarachchi said even though it is difficult to tackle this issue, the government intends to use the Police STF to contain the spread of drugs as much as possible. (NewsWire)
