Oran: 12 drug traffickers heavily sentenced

Five Algerians were sentenced Tuesday in absentia to life imprisonment and seven to 20 years imprisonment by the criminal court of Oran for trying to introduce 720 kg of cannabis in Europe, said the Algerian news agency APS.

•     Two people were acquitted.
   
      Twelve people convicted were trialed after the seizure in January 2008 of 720 kg of cannabis resin hidden in the false ceiling of an empty container bound for Europe.
  
      The drug, from Morocco according to the prosecution, had been hidden in the container arrived in Oran with a so-called load of apples imported from the Netherlands where it had to leave empty.
  
       However, customs officials had discovered the shipment of drugs through a scanner. The owner of the container had been arrested and his accomplices identified.
  
      Five of them, who sentenced in absentia to life imprisonment, were also from Oran, but living in Spain or France.
  
      
  Ennaharonline/ M. O.