Prague, Nov 24 (CTK) – Big pervitin producers in the Czech Republic tend to increase their output and produce still larger amounts of the drug, but the total number of pervitin production facilities remains unchanged, as does the prevalence of small home laboratories, an annual report for 2015 has shown.
The Czech police uncovered 263 such facilities last year, a half of what they uncovered in 2014, but they seized more than twice as much pervitin (hard drug methamphetamine) compared to 2014, a record 106.9 kilograms, according to the report the National drugs and addictions monitoring centre presented on Thursday.
“There has been a continuing trend of rising production of big facilities that can make up to dozens of kilograms of pervitin within a single production cycle. The large-scale pervitin production typically includes a thorough division of labour, and it has been mostly controlled by organised groups coming from Vietnam,” the report says.
The products of large-scale facilities are primarily designated for exports, mainly to Germany and Austria, but also to Slovakia, Poland and the Nordic countries.
Apart from being smuggled by couriers abroad, the drug is also available in market places, bars, gambling rooms and other facilities in the border zones neighbouring on Germany and Austria.
In mid-2015, Prague and Berlin signed a cooperation agreement in areas including the fight against drugs, which is supposed to primarily focus on the production and distribution of pervitin.
The main precursor for pervitin production is pseudoephedrine, which is drawn from medicines imported mainly from Poland, but also smuggled from Turkey via Bulgaria and Poland.
In the Czech Republic, the sales of medicines containing pseudoephedrine has been regulated by strict conditions since 2009, the report says.
Pavla Chomynova, from the National drugs and addictions monitoring centre, told journalists that the number of pervitin laboratories remains stable in the country, but the capacity of large-scale facilities has been rising.
The national drug coordinator, Jindrich Voboril, said domestic drug users have been served by small laboratories to a large extent.
Experts say the Czech Republic is the largest pervitin producer and exporter among all European countries.
According to the report, one gramme of pervitin cost an average 1,190 crowns in the Czech Republic last year, compared to 1,270 in 2014. The price has oscillated between 1,130 and 1,290 crowns since 2007.
