Nigerian customs officers make two busts with guns and cough syrup

More than 800 guns and 100,000 rounds of ammunition concealed in a shipping container were found by Nigerian customs officials on Monday, a senior official said, underscoring the nation’s fight against firearm trafficking, which is connected to an increase in crime.

The firearms discovered on June 21 had been hidden in a container among furniture and other items that had been loaded in Turkey, according to Customs Comptroller-General Bashir Adewale Adeniyi. Ammunition and several gun variants were included in the haul.

Adeniyi said reporters, “We have three suspects in our custody after securing a detention warrant from a competent court,” and that further inquiries were being conducted.

According to Adeniyi, the firearms and ammunition would be turned over to the office of Nigeria’s security adviser for more research and legal action.

Millions of prescription painkiller pills and over a million bottles of codeine cough syrup were taken by authorities in another customs bust on June 29, according to him. Nigeria has a high rate of opioid misuse, and traffickers frequently smuggle codeine cough syrup.

According to Adeniyi, the medicine-filled containers were falsely declared in an effort to avoid import limitations and customs fees.