FATAL HEROIN DOSE TRACED TO CONTAMINATED AFGHAN SOIL

Scientists who have been tracing the source of contamination of heroin
which has killed 59 drug addicts in Ireland, Britain and Scotland believe
the original source of the infection was likely to have been an infected
animal in Afghanistan.

This infection was then passed into the soil and entered the crop. British
scientists have identified a common soil bacterium, clostridium nouyi, as
the likely source of the mystery killer. However, scientists warn that this
may not be the only culprit. They point to the possibility of deliberate
contamination of Europe's heroin by drug dealers through the `cutting' of
heroin with contaminated soil, and they note that in at least one case
anthrax formed part of the lethal cocktail.

Meanwhile, police investigations into the supply routes for the
contaminated heroin have identified the main dealers in the suspect heroin
to be a London-based Turkish family who have been trafficking for over 10
years.

The extended family, involving four families, is headed by two brothers and
a sister who are all in their 40s. One of the brothers has just completed a
four-year prison sentence for drug-related offences in Britain.

British and Irish investigators believe they have plotted the drug supply
route which links the deaths of the addicts in all three countries. The
Sunday Independent has learned that through the London-based Turkish
suppliers the suspect heroin was then shipped to a well-known African
dealer based in Liverpool.

This African dealer and the main supplier had close connections with Derek
Dunne, the Irish drug dealer and former soccer international who was shot
in Amsterdam earlier this year. This dealer continues to distribute
supplies through other associates of Dunne's, including a man known as
Cyclops and at least one other south Dublin dealer.

The African dealer also supplied key dealers in Glasgow, where 30 heroin
addicts contracted the illness, of whom 16 died. In Ireland eight heroin
addicts have died of organ failure caused by the unidentified bacteria. All
of the addicts injected the heroin into the muscle tissue as opposed to the
veins. Warnings about the unidentified infection were first posted by a
doctor in Norway in April of this year when a heroin addict died in Oslo.