German student arrested for smuggling 2.4 kg of crystal meth

German student Franco Holinski, 26, was arrested on Wednesday by Customs and Excise officers at Soekarno-Hatta International Airport for allegedly smuggling 2.4 kilograms of crystal methamphetamine worth Rp 4 billion (US$456,000) into the country.

Holinski is a student at a university in Germany. He is the first ever German citizen arrested for drug smuggling in Indonesia.

“He is the first,” Soekarno-Hatta's Customs and Excise enforcement and investigation unit head Gatot Sugeng Wibowo said Friday as quoted by tempointeraktif.com.

He said that Franco had concealed the drugs in his luggage. “He was arrested on Wednesday but we have only revealed it today for investigative purposes,” he said.

Gatot said Franco arrived on Garuda Indonesia flight GA 098 from Dubai on Wednesday at 9 p.m.. When he got off the plane, customs officers pulled him over for showing suspicious behavior.

“Our suspicions were proven right when we checked his luggage and found packages of drugs concealed in it,” Gatot said.

After arresting Franco and interrogating him, the police's drug division along with the customs and excise team went to Fave Hotel in Wahid Hasyim, Central Jakarta, where they arrested the intended recipient of the packages, identified as Indian national Khanna Narendragangga, 53.

Gatot said he suspected they were part of the Iranian international drug ring.