Record haul of cocaine found inside woman's plush toys at airport
The unnamed 38-year-old Thai woman was carrying nearly 10 kilograms (22 pounds) of cocaine stuffed into three plush toys, Customs Additional Director-General Seevali Arukgoda said.
"This is the biggest attempt at cocaine smuggling stopped by Sri Lanka Customs at the airport," Arukgoda said in a statement.
Customs officials at Bandaranaike International Airport posed for photos with the cocaine, which had been neatly stuffed into just over 500 plastic capsules, with an estimated street value of $1.72 million.
The seizure follows three other hauls this month totaling nearly 60 kilograms of synthetic cannabis.
Three foreign nationals -- from Britain, India, and Thailand -- were arrested in separate cases.
The Briton, identified as Charlotte May Lee, 21, a former cabin crew member from London, was produced before a magistrate on Friday and further remanded until June 13, court officials said.
She was arrested on May 12 when officials discovered that her two suitcases were packed with 46 kilograms of kush, a synthetic drug.
Lee told the BBC she had travelled from Bangkok to Sri Lanka's capital Colombo to renew her Thai visa. She described her living conditions at a prison in Negombo, a city just north of the capital, saying she spends most of her day inside, although she does get to go outside for fresh air.
"I have never been to prison and I've never been to Sri Lanka," she told the BBC. "This heat and just sitting on a concrete floor all of the time."
All four suspects, including the Thai woman arrested on Friday, could face life imprisonment if convicted.
Sri Lankan authorities have previously seized large quantities of heroin off the country's shores, suggesting the island is being used as a transit hub for narcotics destined for other locations.
In October, a Sri Lankan court sentenced 10 Iranian men to life imprisonment after they pleaded guilty to smuggling more than 111 kilograms of heroin. In 2023, nine Iranians received life sentences in a separate drug smuggling case.
Sri Lanka's largest single seizure of narcotics occurred in December 2016, when Customs found 800 kilograms (1,760 pounds) of cocaine in a shipment container of timber addressed to a company in neighboring India.
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