Does South African Airways Have a Drug Problem?

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They say admitting it is the first step. (via Global Spin)

Over at TIME’s new Global Spin blog, Alex Perry reports that a South African Airways employee has been arrested under the suspicion of drug smuggling on a flight to South Africa from Sao Paulo. The employee, a flight attendant who had worked with SAA for 12 years, was placed under arrest after authorities seized five kilos of cocaine.

This is definitely bad news for SAA, especially considering that this incident marks the fifth time an employee of Africa’s largest airline has been arrested for such an offense in just over two years.

(More on TIME.com: See how a U.S. agent’s death hints at drug-war tensions)

Perry notes that SAA’s issues are part of a much larger problem, as the drug trade in Africa has been directly linked to Western drug markets. “According to Western drug and crime monitors in Africa, South America’s cocaine cartels have close to saturated the North American market, while the wars between Mexico’s drug gangs and the police have made that route less attractive,” he writes.

For the full story (and more stories from around the globe), head over to Global Spin.