Kazakhstan ran the nationwide Qarasora operation, the interior ministry’s annual anti-cannabis campaign, from 1 June 2023 against cultivation, harvesting and transport of hemp out of the southern regions and against organised groups distributing drugs.[1] Special units of the interior ministry, the National Guard and the Defence Ministry took part, and officers used drones and satellite surveys to map where drug-bearing plants grow.[2] In the first month the interior ministry reported 221 drug offences, including 83 sales, 29 cases of large-scale illegal possession, 82 cultivation offences and four drug laboratories.[2]

In the Zhambyl region a local resident was detained after preparing 232 kg of marijuana, and a search of his barn found a sack with 24.5 kg of hashish and 12 kg of dried marijuana.[2] In Rudny, Kostanay region, a resident was held with 2.5 kg of hashish, along with a service pistol, a sawn-off hunting rifle, more than 200 cartridges and money in tenge and US dollars.[2] Two residents of the Shu district in Zhambyl region were detained in Almaty after bringing 90 kg of marijuana and 2 kg of hashish there to sell.[2] In Konaev, Almaty region, a local resident was detained for growing more than a thousand cannabis bushes weighing about 50 kg at his home.[2] In Ekibastuz police took two grow boxes and 11 pots with planted cannabis from a woman, seizing 110 drug-bearing plants weighing 40 kg as evidence.[2] In Turkestan region officers destroyed two opium poppy plantations of 10,600 bushes and more than 840 cannabis bushes, putting the combined weight of the drug-bearing plants at about 230 kg.[2]

The interior ministry said officers took more than a tonne of drugs out of circulation, including 614 kg of marijuana and 29 kg of hashish, a cannabis total of 643 kg.[3] That list also included 4 kg of synthetic drugs and about 1 kg of heroin, which are excluded from the cannabis figures here.[4]