Customs: over 4,600 drug parcels in four months, mostly for teenagers
Synthetic cannabinoids are especially dangerous, the customs agency warns. The revenue agency reports minors betting online using their parents' details.
Symbolic image · Photo: zonemars / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0 (cropped and resized)
Bulgaria's Customs Agency has found more than 4,600 parcels containing drugs over the past four months, most of them intended for teenagers. The figure was given at the launch of the joint campaign "You Are Not Alone" by Customs and the National Revenue Agency (NAP) at the National School of Finance and Business in Sofia. It was the campaign's first event of the new school year.
Deputy Customs Director Stefan Bakalov warned in particular about synthetic cannabinoids, which he said are "extremely powerful" and "trigger severe psychoses". Thousands of substances are on offer and supply is so large that it cannot be stopped, he said, so the main goal is "to defeat demand". The absence of border controls since Schengen accession makes customs work harder, but large shipments of dangerous substances of unclear composition are still being intercepted.
The campaign also addresses gambling: it is banned for under-18s, but according to NAP many children find ways to bet anyway – often using their parents' identities without their knowledge. NAP communications director Anna Mitova said gambling addiction is one of the common causes of suicide. More than 2,000 illegal betting sites have been blocked since the start of the year, and over 8,500 in total so far.