“We cannot just look at the airport and the ports. In my opinion, a substantial part of the importation (of drugs) comes in from the coast clandestinely. It is very easy to hide drugs, perhaps easier than ferrying immigrants on power boats,” he tells The Malta Independent in an interview (see pages 4 and 5).

“Just one drug packet can fetch up to Lm100,000 on the local market. It’s so easy to hide, to move and basically to import. This is one area we must focus on,” he continues.

Dr Gulia also insists that a clear distinction must be made between a trafficker and a user when people are arraigned in court. In this way, we can concentrate better on cracking down on barons rather than confusing the issue between trafficking and users.

“When we say we want a war, we want to wage it only on drug barons. We are referring to those who import drugs to sell them on the local market and contribute to the national drug problem.”