The Saudi authorities seized a pomegranate shipment in which captagon pills are hidden; consequently, KSA decided to ban the entry of all the Lebanese fruits and vegetables.
Head of Farmers Syndicate in Bekaa, Ibrahim Tarshishi, told Al-Manar that Lebanon has never exported pomegranate, adding the truck involved in the operation is not Lebanese.
Tarshishi added that Saudi is the biggest market which purchases the Lebanese agricultural products, hoping that the crisis gets resolved imminently.
It is worth noting that the Saudi authorities have never taken such punitive measures in dealing with similar cases, as upon seizing ten million captagon pills imported from UAE in 2019 and eight million captagon pills imported from Turkey in 2020.
In 2015, the Saudi prince Abdul Mohsen bin Waleed bin Abdul Mohsen bin Abdul Aziz Al Saud, aka Captagon Prince, was arrested in Lebanon while attempting to smuggle two tone of captagon pills. Then, Saudi pressured the Lebanese authorities to release him.
Lebanon did not take punitive measures against the entire kingdom in 2015, yet KSA decided in 2021 to punish an entire nation over one marked pomegranate shipment. Finally, how will the Lebanese authorities deal with the Saudi decision?
Source: Al-Manar English Website
