The police say they have smashed an international drug trafficking syndicate using college students as couriers with the arrest of four African men and a local woman, a report said today.

Police seized RM1.7 million worth of heroin during the raid in an wealthy neighbourhood in the capital, the Star daily reported.

Investigators told the daily the syndicate had paid local college students up to RM35,000 to courier the drugs overseas by swallowing them or inserting the parcels in their bodies.

"The students believed they would escape inspection if they consumed or hid the drug packets inside their bodies," anti-narcotics chief Zul Hasnan Najib Baharuddin told the paper.

He said the students were sent to countries including Australia, China, Brazil, Argentina and Japan.

Zul Hasnan said the syndicate was busted after police monitored the students for more than a month, the Star reported.

"The West Africans entered the country after obtaining student visas to pursue studies at colleges and universities," the paper quoted Zul Hasnan as saying.

Police arrested the group as they were packing the drugs, seizing 126 sachets containing 3.1 kilos of heroin, the daily reported. - AFP