Britons' Ghana jail nightmare ends

http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/rss/-/1/hi/world/africa/7511181.stm

Version 0 of 1.

For Yasemin Vatansever and Yetunde Diya, their nightmare has come to an end.

The girls denied being recruited to transport drugs to the UKThe two girls from north London were caught last July at Ghana's international airport with 6kg of cocaine.

They were just 16 years old when customs officials pulled them aside as they waited to check in for a flight home after a brief trip to Ghana.

They were carrying two laptop bags with the drugs hidden inside.

The students made numerous court appearances and faced years in a Ghanaian jail. They pleaded innocence but were eventually sentenced to 12 months in a juvenile detention facility.

Sabine Zanker, of Fair Trials International, visited the girls ahead of their release on 17 July and said they had been well looked after and were now looking forward to returning home to continue their education.

"I think it has changed them for the better because they will appreciate little things in the future and they will appreciate the love of their family. It has brought them closer together.

"They will have problems to trust anybody in the future but it will also make them much more careful," Ms Zanker said. As far as we know the men in Ghana and the UK who lured them to come here have not been arrested although their names and their identities are known Sabine ZankerFair Trials International <a class="" href="/1/hi/england/london/7511261.stm">UK girls freed in Ghana</a>

In addition to exercise, the teenagers have learnt how to sew whilst in a juvenile detention facility where they were the only girls being held.

They have apparently made good friends there, and food was basic - often rice only but the British High Commission has helped out with fruit and other provisions.

Diya and Vatansever thought they were to be released in April after Ghanaian officials suggested they would serve nine months of the sentence. But just days before that release date they were told to stay put until July.

"These girls were the small fry and not the big fish," said Ms Zanker.

"As far as we know the men in Ghana and the UK who lured them to come here in the first place have not been arrested although their names and their identities are known to the police.

"The perpetrators are still at large whilst these girls have been confined to a prison for one year."

New drugs route

The world's cocaine supply starts its journey in South American countries like Peru, Bolivia, Venezuela or Colombia.

Traditionally it was trafficked through the Caribbean and was carried to Europe by drug mules.

But successful crackdowns on smugglers operating between Jamaica and Britain has led to a new route being opened up.

West Africa is the new favoured territory because surveillance and security are generally poor.

There have been major seizures in Ghana, Nigeria, Guinea-Bissau and Senegal. Earlier this month over 700kg were found on a plane at Sierra Leone's airport.

Interpol estimates that more than a third of the cocaine arriving in Europe is now trafficked through West Africa.

Too tempting

Passengers turning up at Accra's Kotoka airport are greeted by an array of billboards warning against drug smuggling.

The o's in the phrase "Good Luck" are handcuffs and there are grim posters depicting the lethal risk that people take when they swallow wraps of cocaine that can burst in the stomach.

For many the chance to make some quick money is all too tempting, and for the past 18 months customs officials from Ghana and Britain have been working together to catch the smugglers.

Under Operation Westbridge, 191 seizures have been made between the UK and Ghana. They have found 421kg of cocaine, in addition to heroin and cannabis.

The estimated street value of the drugs intercepted is more than £75m ($150m), and while nine British nationals have been locked up, 47 Ghanaians have been detained.

Having served their sentences, Yasemin Vatansever and Yetunde Diya will now head to the airport for a second time.

They may have been the youngest to be caught on this smuggling route, but the lucrative trade means they will not be the last and others will serve far harsher sentences.