AMMAN —
The Emirates Policy Center (EPC) published a comprehensive study this week on
Jordan’s war against drug smuggling from Syria. The study refers to Amman’s
efforts to reengage with Damascus as of last summer, marking a turning point on
Syria’s conflict timeline as well as the Syria-Jordan bilateral relations.
اضافة اعلان
“While Amman is clearly not under the
illusion that reengagement with Syria will solve all its problems, Jordan sees
it as a more productive alternative than maintaining the status quo in its
relations — that is, being part of western-led efforts to politically and
economically isolate Syria,” the study said.
It added that “isolating Syria offered
little if any solution to Jordan’s many problems: countering drug smuggling,
repairing economic ties, security and economic stability in southern Syria,
refugee return (at least partially), water sharing, and addressing the presence
of Iranian and pro-Iranian forces on the Jordanian-Syrian border area.”
The study pointed out that drug smuggling
and border security are perhaps the most urgent of Jordanian concerns, which
have also been discussed in bilateral meetings.
The study said that “the Syrian regime has
weaponized drug production and export, and more importantly has grown dependent
on drug economy after the war, sanctions and the financial crisis in Lebanon
near-destroyed the Syrian economy.”
The study suggested that only a regional
approach could tackle the drug issue, and until such an approach is adopted —
with a degree of support from the Syrian government — Jordan will continue to
face a stream of narcotics.
“In other words, for the time being,
securing Jordan’s borders seems the most realistic option that Jordan as well
as regional actors have,” it added.
The study referred to drug smuggling on the
Jordanian-Syrian border as a decades-old problem, driven by corruption under
both the Syrian regime and Jordan’s convenient path to Saudi Arabia and the
Arab Gulf. At the end of 1990s, the US delisted Syria from the major
drug-producing countries. “Thus, during the decade that preceded the civil war,
Syria was considered more of a transit route, and so was Jordan,” the study
said.
War in Syria has significantly altered that
reality. A few years into the conflict, reports surfaced about increased
production of illicit amphetamines in Syria. The specific narcotic fueling the
smuggling is called Captagon, a type of amphetamine that acts as a
psycho-stimulant. Reportedly, the production and export drastically increased
in 2018, according to the study.
According to many reports, Hezbollah and
President Bashar Assad’s younger brother Maher, the head of the fourth armored
division, play a central role in managing the drug economy, which suggests that
the economy is protected by the regime itself. Syrian drug production centers
are scattered across the country and some are run by Hezbollah near Daraa.
Jordanian authorities, the study said,
affirm that trafficking takes place all along the border. For decades smuggling
took place in Jordan’s eastern region, where an unforgiving desert lies, and
these routes remain active. Trafficking also occurs through the fluid border in
the northwest (opposite Syria’s Daraa governorate) where drugs pass through the
city of Ramtha and the governorate of Mafraq down to Maan, to go through the
border with Saudi Arabia; a massive demand market where pills have been found
to sell for as much as $16 each.
The study went on to say the issue took new
proportions in 2019 when the Kingdom itself ceased to be a mere passage for
such drugs, but rather a market. By 2020, Jordan publicly highlighted the
issue, both with splashy media coverage of captured pills, as well as severe
sentences for those apprehended smugglers. By winter of 2022 Jordan changed its
rules of engagement with smugglers, and a border skirmish resulted in the
deaths of 27 smugglers. Jordan has stated the importance of its fight against
drug smuggling and increased resources towards it.
Part of Jordan’s approach to counter drug
smuggling, according to the study, has been the strengthening of its border
security with Syria, especially since according to security officials, Jordan
is becoming not only a transit route but also a destination where lower quality
product is sold for as little as $1 per Captagon pill. Jordan has raised the
issue of border security with Syria during high level meetings in 2021, and has
shored up its defenses against smuggling networks and also asked allies to
help.
It is important to note that Jordan has not
accused the Syrian regime of directly protecting and even managing drug
traffickers; rather it has accused “militias,” “armed groups”, or porous
borders and corruption, the study says. Nevertheless, there is near certainty
in Amman that production happens under the regime’s protection.
In January 2022, amidst increased
trafficking and related violence, a Jordanian officer was killed in a smuggling
confrontation on the border. Shortly thereafter, the Jordanian military changed
its rules of engagement. According to Jordanian authorities, 13 smuggling attempts
are curbed by the relevant authorities every day with an emerging aggressive
behavior and large number of smugglers (up to 200 persons) in one smuggling
operation, according to the source.
Jordan has also received help from allies
over the years, the study said. In 2021, the US gave Jordan $500 million for
border security as part of its foreign military assistance — focused on
stopping the drug traffic at its northern border. Seemingly, the US has also
directed Syrian rebels that it sponsors in the Syrian Al-Tanf area in the
desert where Jordanian, Syrian and Iraqi borders meet, to conduct anti-drug
smuggling operations.
The study concludes that “without
coordinated effort to break the production wheel and network in Syria that
includes targeting Hezbollah and 4th division, which help produce and traffic
the drugs, and improve the economic situation for average Syrians, drug
trafficking is bound to continue.”
To make matters worse, even if the Syrian
regime wanted to eradicate drug production, it won’t be able to do so without
building an alternative economy, which will be extremely difficult given the
size of drug economy, state of Syria’s collapsed economy and western sanctions,
it said.
The daunting enormity of these challenges
means that Jordan will face a long-term rush of narcotics, and it needs to
prepare for it, the study said. “The narcotics crises is simply bigger than
Jordan, and larger than Jordan-Syria reengagement calculations, which partly
explains the regime’s near inaction to stop narcotic production despite it
being a Jordanian top priority,” the study said. Thus, border security remains
crucial for Jordan, and perhaps the only tool to defend its interests for the
time being. But, by defending its borders Jordan is also defending the Gulf’s
borders with Syria, especially that the Gulf — and not Jordan — is a more
lucrative and important market.
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