One million captagon pills are burned by Syrian officials.

DAMASCUS: According to two security officials, Syria’s new government set fire to a sizable drug cache on Wednesday. Among the medicines was a million captagon pills, whose mass manufacturing thrived under former President Bashar al-Assad.

During the more than 13-year civil war, Syria became the world’s largest exporter of captagon, an illegal amphetamine-like stimulant that essentially turned the country into a narcostate under Assad.

A member of the security forces wearing a balaclava and asking to be identified only by his first name, Osama, said, “We found a large quantity of captagon, around one million pills.” His khaki uniform featured a “public security” emblem.

In the Kafr Sousa neighborhood of the city, a journalist witnessed forces burning and dousing a stash of cannabis, the painkiller tramadol, and about 50 packets of pink and yellow captagon pills in a security compound that had once belonged to Assad’s forces.

Saudi Arabia, which is rich in oil, has been a significant destination for captagon, which has recently inundated the illicit market throughout the area.

Another security force member, who went by Hamza, claimed that while the new government’s security forces were examining the security quarter, they stumbled onto a narcotics warehouse.

He claimed that in an effort to “protect Syrian society” and “cut off smuggling routes used by Assad family businesses,” authorities destroyed the inventories of hashish, alcohol, cannabis, and captagon.

Alcohol has long been easily accessible in Syria, but the country’s new rulers have not yet clarified their stance on the matter.

Production facilities

Syria’s new authorities have reported that large amounts of captagon had been discovered in previous government locations across the nation, particularly security branches, since a rebel alliance overthrew Assad on December 8 following a quick offensive.

Journalists in Syria reported witnessing Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) members burn what they claimed were captagon caches discovered at former Assad military installations.

Hamza, a member of the security force, stated on Wednesday that “this is not the first initiative of its kind—the security services, in a number of locations, have found other warehouses… and drug manufacturing sites and destroyed them in the appropriate manner.”

Maher al-Assad, a military commander and Bashar al-Assad’s brother, is thought to be the driving force behind the profitable captagon trade, and experts think the former leader of Syria used the threat of unrest fueled by drugs to exert pressure on Arab governments.

According to a government source, a Saudi delegation met with Ahmed al-Sharaa, the new leader of Syria, in Damascus on Sunday to talk about the “Syria situation and captagon.” In recent years, Jordan has also taken strong action against the smuggling of drugs and weapons, including captagon, along its 230-mile (375-kilometer) border with Syria.