What is Captagon, a drug that might “surge in France” | EUROtoday
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” Lhe captagon will flood into France from the ports of Marseille and northern Europe. » On February 26, Émile Diaz, known as “Milou”, 81 years old, the last trafficker of the former French Connection, alerted a Senate commission of inquiry into drug trafficking of a possible arrival in France of Captagon. “In France, it will end badly, the future is dark,” he added.
But what’s captagon? These small white drugs stamped with a brand within the form of two half-moons are generally, and wrongly, referred to as “the jihadist’s drug”. Straight from the Middle East, captagon is alleged to be circulating among the many golden youth of the Gulf international locations, offered for 20 {dollars} per tablet. But additionally it is present in Syria, for the modest sum of lower than 1 greenback per dose.
READ ALSO Jihad: terrorists underneath captagonSynthetic drug, captagon, its scientific title fenetylline, consists of amphetamines and theophyllines. Its results are superior to these of traditional amphetamine: a robust stimulant of the central nervous system, it boosts focus and bodily efficiency. On the opposite hand, it causes extreme cardiovascular issues, but in addition psychological issues and intense hallucinations. According to the French Observatory of Drugs and Addictive Tendencies (OFDT), illicit captagon, the article of fantasies and hypothesis, is in actuality “speed” in “cachetons” usually lower with caffeine.
An essential enterprise for the Syrian regime
Captagon is a drug initially developed by the German pharmaceutical firm Degussa within the Nineteen Sixties to deal with childhood consideration deficit dysfunction (ADHD), narcolepsy and despair. In 1990, this molecule was included within the narcotics file and a decree in 1995 prohibited its manufacture and sale in France.
But, within the Middle East, trafficking of this drug, with a modified recipe, continued to proliferate. As the OFDT notes, “the tablets sold on drug markets in the Arab world under the name captagon are counterfeits having an appearance and bearing a logo similar to those of the original captagon. The name Captagon has been retained; it has somehow been transferred from the licit market, from which the original drug has now disappeared, to the illicit market. For the rest, the captagon no longer has much to do with the captagon.
In the 1990s, the production of this “poor man’s cocaine” was primarily concentrated in South-Eastern Europe. But the accession of the Balkans to the EU has pushed traffickers to provide their substances in Lebanon, underneath the management of Hezbollah, and particularly in Syria, as defined The world. During the conflict in Syria, Islamic State fighters, rebels and loyalist forces reportedly used the drug. The Assad household can also be accused of taking advantage of unlawful captagon trafficking. According to Euronews, the Syrian regime generates thrice the quantity of commerce of the Mexican cartels due to this illicit trafficking.
A reputation taken from media rumors
But then, the place do nicknames such because the “magic potion of Daesh”, the “drug of terrorists” and the “drug of jihadists” come from? As the OFDT explains in a be aware in 2017, these qualifiers check with a possible use of this drug by Daesh troopers, the consumption of amphetamines inside the framework of army operations being documented.
However, in line with the workplace, there may be nothing to say with certainty that the terrorists, notably these of November 13, 2015, consumed it. “On the contrary, at the beginning of January 2016, we learned that the autopsies of the bodies of the terrorists of November 13 demonstrated that they had consumed “neither narcotics nor alcohol” earlier than finishing up the act,” says the 'OFDT. This suggestion of using captagon by terrorists through the assaults of November 13, 2015 had been put ahead by the press. Later, these similar media, together with THE Point, put an finish to those speculations. But the time period remained in public debate.
READ ALSO How captagon is panicking the worldIn actuality, in line with the OFDT, it could be false to say that “the “ordinary” captagon constitutes nothing aside from the drug of jihadists, the substance par excellence of Daesh fighters and, by extension, of its Western and notably French cronies, which goal parts have till now often denied.”
https://www.lepoint.fr/eureka/drogue-du-djihadiste-qu-est-ce-que-le-captagon-une-drogue-qui-pourrait-deferler-en-france-21-03-2024-2555636_4706.php