PDEA chief Director General Wilkins Villanueva (left) and Mr. Brett Blackshaw, Political Counselor, US Department of State (right) attend the turnover ceremony of USDEA donation of equipment to PDEA agents. /PDEA PIO
MANILA, Philippines — The Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA) on Wednesday received from the United States Drug Enforcement Agency (USDEA) several units of narcotics detection equipment that will help boost its capabilities against drug smuggling via airports.
PDEA Director General Wilkins Villanueva said in a speech during the turnover ceremony of the equipment at the PDEA Headquarters in Quezon City: “These [pieces of] equipment will surely enhance the investigation capabilities of our airport interdiction task force equipment will surely help us, particularly in the airport intervention unit.”
In a statement, PDEA said the USDEA donated the following narcotics detection equipment:
- Three Rigaku handheld drug analyzers
- Two N2200 handheld narcotics detectors
- Two Viken HBI-120 handheld X-ray imagers
- One B & W TEK tactic ID-1064 handheld Raman spectrometer
- One Heuresis handheld X-ray unit
PDEA said USDEA, in collaboration with the United States International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs Bureau (INL), gave the supplies to PDEA Inter-Agency Drug Interdiction Task Group (PDEA-IADITG), the lead agency for transnational drug trafficking investigations at airports.
PDEA said the equipment will be used by anti-narcotics agents assigned at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport terminals.