TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - Police in the westernmost Indonesian province of Aceh have foiled an attempt by an international drug ring to smuggle 81 kilograms of drugs from Malaysia through the sea route and arrested nine suspects.

“One of them was dealt with sternly for resisting the police while (officials were) trying to arrest him. But, he was pronounced dead at the hospital,” chief of the Aceh Provincial Police, Inspector General Wahyu Widada, said on Tuesday.

All nine suspects are residents of Aceh and North Sumatra provinces and are believed to be members of an international drug ring, he informed. They were arrested from different locations in East Aceh district early on October 30, 2020.

The arrests were made after police received a tip on smuggling of drugs from Malaysia to Aceh via sea, said Widada.

It took police a month to investigate the smuggling operation. The drugs were seized after police searched a car in Idi Cut in East Aceh, he said.

After their car was stopped by police, two of the suspects, identified by their initials as AB and AZ, tried to resist arrest and were shot on their legs, he said.

The police found four plastic sacks of 81 Chinese tea packs containing 81 kilograms of crystal meth and four plastic packs of 100 thousand ecstasy pills, weighing 20 kilograms, in the car, Widada said.

The remaining suspects were arrested after police conducted an in-depth investigation into the case, he said.

Police also seized five cars, four motorcycles, a motorboat, mobile phones, ATM cards, and bank account books from them.

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ANTARA