A reader sent me the two news articles below to check out. Both covering the same story but each with their own interpretation on the nationality, airport and container the marijuana was found in:
Kuwait Times
Customs officers at Sheikh Saad Al-Abdallah airport foiled a Sri Lankan man’s attempt to smuggle two kilograms of marijuana inside two cans of dried chili. He was sent to the Drug Control General Directorate (DCGD) for questioning. (Sep 13)
vs
Arab Times
An Indian expatriate was arrested at Kuwait International Airport for attempting to smuggle two kilograms of marijuana into the country. According to an informed source, when customs officers were checking the luggage of the passengers who arrived in the country on Friday, they noticed that one of the passengers was nervous. They checked his details to discover he is an Indian expatriate and they checked his luggage to find marijuana hidden inside a pack of almonds. He was arrested and referred to the Directorate General for Drug Control for necessary legal action against him. (Sep 13)
Why is there so much discrepancy between the two articles? If they can’t get a simple story right how badly are they doing on more complicated ones? Last month Arabian Business was also caught making shit up related to Kuwait as well.
On top of those inaccuracies, I’m not an expert here but how the hell do you fit 2KG of marijuana in your luggage yet alone in a chili can or a pack of almonds? So much of the above doesn’t make any sense. Check this video on YouTube to see how 2KG of marijuana looks like [YouTube] (Spoiler: It’s huge)
Update: Arab Times have posted the same news story again for a second time today with a slight adjustment.
Arab Times (Try #2)
Customs officers at the Sa’ad Al-Abdullah Airport recently foiled an attempt by a Bangladeshi to smuggle 2 kilos of marijuana in to the country, reports Al-Anba daily. According to security sources, the suspect arrived at the Kuwait International Airport from a neighboring country. The drugs were reportedly hidden between chili powder packs.
Note they don’t mention its a correction, they just treat it as a new news story. So they basically could be copying pasting old news as new news to fill up their pages and no one will be any the wiser.
17 replies on “Kuwait Times vs Arab Times”
LoL ! Now the exact same source (Arabtimes) mentioned two completely different information about the nationality of the smuggler !
I will reconsider Arabtimes as a source. I knew about Arabian business and never fully trusted it anyway.
Sri Lankan -> Indian -> Bangladeshi. I’m guessing they each have their ‘sources’ at the airport who stereotyped them into one or the other.
Anyway, it was probably hashish so easier to get a 2kg brick into a smaller space, although I have no idea how big a 2kg block of hashish would be!
Tomorrow they will report it was a Pakistani. Then Afghan. Then Irani. Might just turn out he was Kuwaiti…
It was probably ganja. Noting worth smoking anyway, worth the confiscation.
Both are different incidents that happened at different airports:
– Chili weed incident: https://instagram.com/p/7iLMhBl35d/
– Weed with nuts incident: https://instagram.com/p/7f8kVBl34T/
And just a few hours ago they caught someone with 10kg of weed (You can compress weed quite a bit), and that’s what is looks like: https://instagram.com/p/7p3SqqF311/
BTW, these incidents are repeating daily. All with huge amounts of weed and the stupidest crudest way of smuggling it through ‘disposable’ people. Here’s a few more incidents just from the past month:
– 8KG weed in Shrimp and Meat: https://instagram.com/p/646kpRF31y/
– Weed in ice-cream: https://instagram.com/p/62sdLAl3xT/
– 2KG weed (not hidden): https://instagram.com/p/6z_qaxF34k/
– More unhidden weed: https://instagram.com/p/6xSCWoF34k/
– 1KG compressed weed block: https://instagram.com/p/6nl6e-l3xI/
– 3KG weed in tamarind: https://instagram.com/p/6hmlguF3wi/
– 2KG weed in nuts (different incident): https://instagram.com/p/6aVGBKl385/
– 5KG of heroine: https://instagram.com/p/62cy3FF3z-/
– 2KG Qat: https://instagram.com/p/7Fy1fBl33x/
– 2KG Qat in honey: https://instagram.com/p/6Z_nfMl3_e/
Because local english newspapers are shitty tabloids.
No wonder they use terms like Asian expat 😀
+infinity right here LOL
the morale of this story is: don’t read the news
damn, if only i had that much pot
The saddest thing is nobody asks why all this stuff is illegal.
What harm does it do?
How much does it cost to police these drugs vs how much harm do these drugs do to society.
Many studies have proven that it is much better to legalize.
You know who they are bringing it in for right? In my time in Kuwait, the ppl i worked with (Kuwaitis) were importing alcohol and other substances VIA these third country nationals. Busts happened frequently but of course the bigwigs never get caught cus they got all them fancy last names. The actual puppets though? deported IF they were lucky – nowadays I’m not sure, but trading in this stuff is death penalty isnt it?
you’re right.
i know someone who works for a very well reputed kuwaiti family, heading one of the biggest corporations in kuwait and he does the very same thing.
I have always been whinging about the quality of english newspaper reporting in Kuwait. I hope someday in the future, reporters from the Arab Times and Kuwait Times will actually go into the field and find out information and fact check and grammar check before posting news. And hopefully it won’t be censored or tabloid style news.
I don’t understand this post. Aren’t these two separate incidents?! On what basis did you assume it is the same incident but reported in a different way?
The newspapers in Kuwait are all crap. So many articles on international news are blatantly lifted word for word from Reuters, Yahoo etc. without any acknowledgement or citation. I cannot recall the number of items I’ve read a news article online, only to see it repeated word for word on either Kuwait or Arab Times.