Diyarbakır anti-narcotics police detained five suspects at the entrance to Çınar district after intercepting a cannabis convoy bound for Mardin.[1] Police named those held only by initials: minibus driver M.E.G. and four people in the escort cars, F.D., D.D., F.B. and R.C.[2]

Officers searching the stopped minibus and two scout cars found about 500 kilograms of kubar esrar, the Turkish term for herbal cannabis.[2] They also seized one unlicensed pistol with nine cartridges loaded in its magazine.[2] Police said the cannabis had been collected in Lice district and was being moved by minibus toward Mardin with two escort vehicles travelling ahead.[2] The teams had started work after receiving a tip that a drug shipment was about to move.[2]

The operation was carried out by teams of the Diyarbakır Provincial Police Directorate’s Narcotics Crimes Combat Branch, the province’s anti-drug unit.[2] Afterward, officers arranged the seized drug sacks to spell “Afrin” to send greetings to Turkish soldiers serving in the Olive Branch operation around Afrin in Syria.[2]