By Álvaro Mellizo
Damascus, Dec 15 (EFE).- As Syria transitions away from Bashar al-Assad’s rule, the scale of the former regime’s dependence on the captagon trade, a powerful amphetamine dubbed “the cocaine of the poor,” is coming to light.
In a vast warehouse 25 km north of Damascus, guarded by an insurgent fighter, millions of dollars’ worth of captagon pills lie scattered on the floor.
“This empire sustained the Assad regime,” said a militant from the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) militant group that led the coalition of rebels that overthrew Assad’s government in just 12 days of intense fighting, ending 53 years of rule by the Assad family.
A hidden empire uncovered
Seized by the Fourth Division of the Syrian Army, the warehouse, once disguised as a potato chip factory, was led by Maher al-Assad, Bashar’s younger brother and a central figure in the production and trafficking of captagon.
The heavily guarded facility, located on military grounds, was inaccessible to civilians.
Inside, the basement reeked of chemicals, and the floor was covered with a fine powder from millions of captagon pills spilling out of hollowed-out industrial batteries.
Each battery concealed approximately four kilograms of the addictive stimulant, worth $10 to $25 per pill on the black market.
HTS forces discovered the warehouse in flames during their takeover, with machinery and chemical equipment already removed.
Only fuel drums and scattered evidence remained, pointing to an attempted cover-up.
Assad’s Financial Lifeline
International organizations and governments have long accused the Assad regime of running a multi-billion-dollar captagon trade.
A report by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) revealed that Syria is the primary source of captagon in the Middle East.
The UK Foreign Office estimated the trade’s value at $57 billion annually, three times the combined income of Mexican drug cartels.
The drug trade served as the financial lifeline for the Assad regime, enriching its inner circle and militias at the expense of the Syrian people, the UK government said.
A study by Der Spiegel reported that in 2021 alone, Syria earned $5.7 billion from captagon, a staggering figure compared to the country’s GDP of $8.98 billion that year, as per World Bank data.
More discoveries loom
This warehouse is just one of several caches discovered by HTS militants since their takeover of Damascus.
The insurgent coalition has made public its discoveries, further exposing the regime’s deep ties to the drug trade.
The scale of Syria’s captagon empire highlights the role of illicit trade in propping up Assad’s rule and adds another layer of complexity to the country’s transition.
While public institutions begin to reopen, Syria now faces the daunting task of dismantling this shadow economy and addressing the damage it has wrought. EFE
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