A juvenile court in Accra has deferred sentencing of the two British teenagers who wever convicted last month of drug trafficking.
Yasemin Vatansever and Yatunde Diya will now know their fate on January 9, 2008. The judge is expecting a “social services report” from the British authorities before sentencing.
The two teenagers were stopped in July at Accra’s Kotoka airport after drugs officers said found 13lb (6kg) of cocaine in two laptop computer bags.
Vatansever and Diya claimed they were not aware that the drugs, said to be worth about £300,000, were in their luggage.
Yasemin is the daughter of immigrants from Cyprus, while Yatunde is of Nigerian descent. Both are UK citizens.
Officers of Ghana’s Narcotics Control Board have said the girls were being paid £3,000 each to carry the bags on a flight to Britain.
They say the tickets were bought by men who also paid for the girls’ accommodation and food in Ghana.
West Africa is increasingly becoming a transit point for drugs headed to Europe.
Cocaine, mostly from Colombia, is brought on small planes and dropped on islands off the little-policed Atlantic Ocean coast, then distributed to couriers who carry it into Europe.
British and Ghanaian officials began collaborating last year after the number of drug-related arrests at London airports linked to West African flights surged.
Source: GhanaWeb
