The authorities confiscated the drugs and arrested 11 persons who were behind the heinous attempt, Interior Ministry spokesman Maj. Gen. Mansour Al-Turki announced yesterday.

He said the 11 criminals — six Pakistanis and five Iranians — made an attempt to enter the Kingdom through the eastern borders. Under the Kingdom’s laws, drug traffickers and smugglers face capital punishment.

He said preliminary investigations showed the offenders were part of a criminal network specializing in drug-trafficking from the Iranian territories into the Kingdom and other GCC countries.

Al-Turki said the smugglers were closely observed and followed when they entered the Kingdom's territorial waters and were nabbed while trying to hand over the hashish in mid sea.

He said though Kingdom had confiscated various quantities of drugs before on the eastern shores and the smugglers had admitted that the drugs were coming from Iran, "we never had concrete evidence like this one."

Al-Turki added that within the framework of cooperation to combat drug trafficking, Iran was informed about the operation hoping that the Iranian authorities would show greater willingness to cooperate to bring smugglers to book.