UK officials have said they are supporting a British woman arrested in Sri Lanka amid reports a former cabin crew member has been accused of smuggling cannabis into the South Asian country.
MailOnline and the Sun reported that Charlotte May Lee, 21, from Coulsdon, south London, was detained at the main airport in the country’s capital, Colombo, on Monday after arriving on a flight from Bangkok.
She has reportedly been accused by Sri Lankan authorities of attempting to bring two suitcases containing 46kg (101lbs) of the cannabis strain kush into the country.
A statement from the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office said: “We are supporting a British woman who has been arrested in Sri Lanka and are in contact with her family and the local authorities.”
Kush is a synthetic mixture of cannabis, fentanyl, tramadol and formaldehyde. It has been blamed for wreaking havoc in west Africa, where some reports suggest it is estimated to kill around a dozen people each week and hospitalise thousands in Sierra Leone alone.
Lee is reportedly a former cabin crew member for TUI and has since been working as a beautician.
The case has echoes of that of 18-year-old Bella Culley, who it emerged this week is being held in prison in Georgia on suspicion of drug offences.
Culley was believed to have gone missing in Thailand before she was detained 3,700 miles (6,000km) away in Georgia’s capital, Tbilisi, on 10 May. She appeared in court in Tbilisi on Tuesday accused of illegally buying, possessing and importing large quantities of narcotics, including marijuana.
Georgian police said officers had seized up to 12kg (26lbs) of marijuana and just over 2kg (4.4lbs) of hashish in a travel bag at Tbilisi international airport.
Culley’s family believed she had gone missing in Thailand before Georgian authorities announced her arrest this week. It is thought she flew to the Philippines just after Easter and had been travelling with a friend around the islands before flying to Thailand on around 3 May.
Culley is the great-granddaughter of Frank Cook, a Labour MP who represented Stockton North for 27 years, rising to become a deputy speaker of the Commons. Cook died in January 2012, aged 76, after suffering from lung cancer.
