Police Special Task Force officers have arrested a man allegedly transporting more than two kilogrammes of the drug known as “Kush” in a car at Hokandara, on the eastern edge of the Colombo district.
Hiru News reported the raid was carried out on Saturday by officers of the STF’s Special Operations Unit III, in front of a fuel station on Vanaguru Mawatha in the Malabe police division, acting on information received. Ada Derana said the consignment was recovered from the suspect’s possession during the operation.
Hiru put the seizure at 2 kilogrammes, 105 grammes and 600 milligrammes, and reported that Rs. 39,290 in cash was also found. Ada Derana described the quantity only as more than two kilogrammes and did not mention the cash.
Both outlets said the man arrested is 32 years old. They differ on where he lives: Ada Derana, citing the STF, described him as a resident of Kalalgoda, while Hiru said he is from Pannipitiya. The two are neighbouring suburbs in the same corridor south-east of Colombo. Neither report named him, gave a court date, or said whether anyone else was being sought.
The street name is also rendered differently — Ada Derana writes Wanaguru Mawatha, Hiru writes Vanaguru Mawatha.
A drug that keeps turning up in small, high-value seizures
“Kush” is a synthetic cannabis preparation that has featured repeatedly in Sri Lankan enforcement cases over the past year, typically in quantities far smaller than the cannabis and heroin consignments that dominate seizure statistics, but carrying a high street value. In one earlier case a photographer was arrested at Bandaranaike International Airport with a consignment valued at Rs. 25 million after arriving from Bangkok.
Neither report gave a valuation for Saturday’s seizure.
The STF has taken an increasingly visible role in narcotics enforcement. Public Security Ministry officials have said the unit is deployed into areas where regular police divisions have not contained drug distribution, and it has led a series of larger operations, including seizures of Kerala cannabis in Kalutara and Jaffna.
