The drugs came from South America.

The drug control department of the interior ministry has busted a trafficking ring that used couriers to smuggle cocaine from South America to Belarus.

The officers arrested the leader of the ring, a 33-year-old Minsk resident, who had been convicted of drug trafficking in Russia and a 42-year-old drug trafficker, an unemployed man resident in the Belarusian capital city, according to the interior ministry's press office.

Ca. 240 grams of cocaine believed to have been brought by the courier to Belarus on a plane the previous day was found at the apartment that the men had rented, the press office said. One more man who was used by the ring as a drug mule was arrested this past March, said the press office.

The couriers usually swallowed about 240 grams of cocaine in capsules to smuggle it into Belarus and were paid $2,000 to $2,500 for one trip.

The drug was further smuggled into St. Petersburg, Moscow and the European Union. The press office did not specify the South American country where the cocaine came from.

BelaPAN