YEMEN: TWO PAKISTANIS SENTENCED TO DEATH FOR DRUG SMUGGLING

October 3, 2009: a Yemeni court sentenced two Pakistani fishermen to death and jailed two others for 25 years after convicting them of drug trafficking. Salim Abdulrahim, 46, and Ghulam Khan Mohammed, 50, were given the death penalty for smuggling 1,600 kilos of hashish.
Chaired by Judge Redhwan Al Namer, the Yemen State Security special court acquitted seven other Pakistanis of the same charges of bringing drugs to Yemen. 
Late last year, the 11 Pakistanis were put on trials for charges of bringing to Yemen 1,600 kg of Hashish  "Ratang" from the Pakistani harbour of Kawader on a boat called Zaher. 
The 11 Pakistanis were arrested at the Yemeni eastern coasts of Al Mukalla on June 2008.
Over the last few years, activity of drug smuggling remarkably increased through the Yemeni eastern coasts to Yemen and the neighbouring Gulf countries.
Hundreds of smugglers including Pakistanis, Iranians, and Syrians, were  arrested in the Yemeni coasts over the last two years, with dozens of tons of drugs in their possession.  (Sources: Yemen Observer, Agence France Presse, 03/10/2009)