Maputo — The Mozambican police have announced the arrest of two more drug traffickers at Maputo international airport, found to be carrying cocaine in their stomachs, reports Tuesday's issue of the independent newsheet "Mediafax".

One is a Tanzanian, named as 29 year old Silvestre Bwiru, and the second is a Bolivian woman, 32 year old Ima Zebanne.

Both were arrested a week ago, on 21 August, and had travelled on the same flight of the Portuguese airline TAP, from Lisbon to Maputo.

The police took the two to Maputo Central Hospital, for the extraction of the drug from their stomachs. Bwiru was found to be carrying 80 ampules of cocaine in his stomach, and Zebanne 42.

The cocaine almost certainly originated from Latin America. One of the favourite routes used by traffickers is from Brazil to Maputo via Lisbon.

Since the market for cocaine in Mozambique is small, the drugs are probably taken overland from Maputo to South Africa.

Drug carriers (known as "mules") are regularly arrested at Maputo airport.

Airline crews know how to identify suspected drug mules - they are the ones who neither eat nor drink anything during lengthy flights.

While the small fry are regularly picked up by the police, no arrests have been announced of the people who are running the drug trafficking rings.