DUSHANBE, December 13, 2012, Asia-Plus -- Three operations carried out by officers from the State Committee for National Security (SCNS) have reportedly led to the seizure of a large amount of narcotics in Khatlon province and Dushanbe.

The operations have been carried out over the past four days and 226 kilograms of narcotics have been seized in those operations, the SCNS press center reported on December 13.

Two of those operations have been carried out in the border districts of Panj and Qumsangir in the southern Khatlon province and the third one has been carried out in Dushanbe.

In the operation carried out by the security service officers jointly with border guards in the Panj district, several Afghan drug smugglers were reportedly wounded.  176 kilograms of hashish and a foreign-made carbine were found on the scene of skirmish seized.

In the Qumsangir district, the security service officers jointly with border guards detained the Afghan national Shamsiddin waladi Kholmurod who illegally cross the border river.  9.5 kilograms of raw opium were confiscated from him.

The third operation was carried out in Dushanbe and three persons – Ikromiddin Khudoinazarov, Khurshed Rasoulov and Karim Karimov – were arrested on suspicion of having been involved in drug pushing.  80 packages of narcotic drug that tested positive to hashish weighing some 40 kilograms were confiscated from them.

Criminal proceedings have been instituted an investigation is under way.

Since the beginning of this year, officers from the SCNS jointly with border guards have reportedly seized 3,180 kilograms of narcotics.