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ith airport security getting tighter, it seems that drug smugglers are turning to less-guarded harbors as gateways to bring narcotics into Jakarta.

Tanjung Priok Port Police said on Tuesday that they had arrested two couriers attempting to smuggle 26.8 kilograms of first-grade crystal methamphetamine into Jakarta on Dec. 31.

“We found out from questioning them that they would have distributed the crystal meth on New Year’s Eve,” port police chief Adj. Sr. Comr. Asep Safrudin told The Jakarta Post.

The two couriers, identified only as A.K. and M., had just disembarked from the Lambelu ferry, when port policemen approached them to inquire about the two travel bags they were carrying.

When the two fled, the policemen chased them along the wharf and apprehended them. The two travel bags were then opened and were found to contain seven plastic bags of crystal meth. “The 26.8 kilograms of crystal meth is worth Rp 50 billion (US$5.45 million),” Asep said.

The two claimed that they had been instructed by a drug dealer, identified only as J.O., to transport the illegal substance from Tanjung Pinang, Riau Islands, to Jakarta by sea.

J.O. traveled from Tanjung Pinang to Jakarta by air and had scheduled for A.K. and M. to meet him at a hotel in North Jakarta to retrieve the crystal meth, he said.

“However, when we searched the hotel, J.O. was not there. Perhaps he’d heard about the arrests and had fled,” he added.

Asep conceded that one possible reason A.K. and M. were able to transport the crystal meth so easily was because ports had laxer security systems than airports.

“Airports have multiple X-ray scanners that all luggage has to go through to pass security inspection. Harbor security is not that strict,” he said.

A.K. and M. have been charged under the 2009 Narcotics Law and could face the death penalty if proven guilty.

A late-November report by the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) stated that transnational, organized criminal groups from Africa and the Middle East had expanded their operations to Indonesia in recent years, establishing a legion of drug factories.

The National Narcotics Agency’s annual report released late last month reveals that the agency handled 94 narcotics cases throughout 2011. In the same period, the agency arrested 153 suspects and confiscated evidence worth a total of Rp 28.97 billion.

Narcotics the agency impounded in 2011 included 79.84 kilograms of crystal meth, 255.5 kilograms of marijuana, 50 grams of cocaine, 1.19 kilograms of heroin and 276,995 ecstasy pills.

Death sentences were handed down to 58 drug convicts last year, 17 of whom were Indonesians and 41 were foreigners from Nigeria, China, the Netherlands and other countries. (mim)