[2020 National Audit] The Era of Drug-Free Nation Is Over... South Korea Seizes 984kg of Smuggled Drugs

[Asia Economy (Daejeon) Reporter Jeong Il-woong] The phrase "drug-free country" has become meaningless for South Korea.

According to data submitted by the Korea Customs Service to Kim Tae-heum, a member of the National Assembly's Planning and Finance Committee from the People Power Party (Boryeong·Seocheon, Chungnam), there have been 2,565 cases of drug smuggling detected over the past five years, with a total weight of 984 kg and an estimated value of 1.7999 trillion KRW.

Considering that the typical single dose of drugs is 0.03g, the seized amount corresponds to enough drugs for 32 million people to take simultaneously.

During the same period, the amount of drugs smuggled out of the country (including re-export trade) was 107 kg (estimated value 278 billion KRW), accounting for 10.8% of the total smuggled weight.

In particular, the number of drug smuggling cases from South Korea increased from 1 case in 2016 to 2 cases in 2018 and 3 cases last year. The seized amounts also rose from 735g (estimated value 2.2 billion KRW) in 2016 to 8.141 kg in 2018 and 98 kg (estimated value 251.4 billion KRW) last year.

This supports the argument that it is no longer appropriate to consider South Korea a drug-free country.

Rep. Kim said, "Until just a few years ago, South Korea was called a drug-free country, but now it has reached the point of smuggling drugs overseas worth hundreds of billions of won," adding, "We must block the distribution of smuggled drugs domestically and internationally to ensure the safety of the people is not threatened."

Data on types of drug smuggling detected by the Korea Customs Service over the past five years. Provided by Rep. Kim Tae-heum's office.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.