Drug boss and Assad Cousin Wassim al-Assad arrested

Lured in ambush?

Assad cousin and drug boss: Syrians hold Wassim al-Assad

The Assad regime in Syria was mainly financed by drug trafficking. One of the most powerful bosses has now been caught.

Syrian authorities claimed to arrest a cousin of the fallen dictator Bashar al-Assad. Wassim al-Assad worked as a drug dealer among his government, the Interior Ministry said. The authorities did not give any further details on his arrest. According to the Middle East expert Charles Lister Lister, Wassim al-Assad is being ambushed.

Under the rule of Bashar al-Assad, Syria had developed into a central transshipment point for illegal trade in Captagon. Several people from the closest district of Assad and its allies are said to have been deeply involved in the production and smuggling of drugs. Trading with the amphetamine tablets was one of the most important sources of income in the former regime.

The United States took Wassim al-Assad 2023 with sanctions because he led a paramilitary team and supported the army of his cousin with the revenue from drug trafficking. Bashar al-Assad was overthrown in December by an uprising led by the Islamist HTS militia and fled to Moscow. Most of his family members and his closer circle fled either from Syria or dive.

In 2011, the civil war broke out in Syria, which brought the country’s economy to a standstill and subsequently made Syria a drug state. Militics, warlords and the Assad government took over the captagon production of small criminal groups and turned it into a billion dollar industry. Much of the captagon manufactured in Syria was sold in the countries of the Middle East. Since its takeover in December, the HTS militia has been hard against drug producers.