Police destroy 35kg synthetic cannabis

Local authorities seized and destroyed 35kg of synthetic cannabis in the outskirts of Tbilisi today.

The Interior Ministry of Georgia said over the past 18 months (2013-2014), Georgian police identified 317 cases where people had purchased synthetic cannabis online and had the bio-drugs sent to Georgia though the postal service.

Police also identified several cases where passengers had tried to smuggle the drugs into Georgia when crossing the country’s borders.

A Georgian law on "new psychoactive substances” came into effect on May 1, 2014. Since then it has been illegal to manufacture, purchase, store, sell and ship newly-restricted bio-drugs.

According to the new law, which was developed by the Georgian Ministry of Internal Affairs, trafficking of substances which belong to the class of criminalized chemical compounds is now a criminal offence.

The sentence for illegally manufacturing, producing, purchasing, storing, transporting, sending or selling, shipping into the country, exporting or transiting the psychoactive substances through Georgia can be anywhere up to five years imprisonment.

The Ministry stated the new law identified nine chemical compounds as illegal substances as well as some newly identified psychoactive substances that do not belong to these classes.

The Ministry has been working on amending the law to enforce a tougher stance against psychoactive drugs since November 2013. According to the Ministry's information, the law was based on the new approach of four countries – Austria, Cyprus, the United Kingdom and Switzerland.