Police in Thailand made a historic seizure of methamphetamine tablets near the Myanmar border in the western province of Kanchanaburi. On Tuesday, officers found approximately 50 million methamphetamine tablets stashed in sacks within a freight truck stopped at a joint police-military road check. The truck’s occupants, a man and a woman, were both apprehended.
This quantity of seized methamphetamine tablets sets a record for Thailand, as noted by Jeremy Douglas, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime’s (UNODC) Southeast Asia regional representative. The largest reported seizure in the region occurred in neighboring Laos in October 2021, involving the discovery of 55 million tablets.
“We’ve not seen major cases here in Kanchanaburi for a couple of years, and never anything like this,” remarked Douglas. “But it’s also not a surprise given the extreme supply being produced by militias and traffickers in northern Myanmar.”
Myanmar has traditionally been the principal drug-producing area in the region, attributed to inadequate security measures in border regions where minority ethnic groups have long fought for greater autonomy. For decades, prominent ethnic armed organizations in Myanmar have been extensively involved in narcotics production.
The military takeover in Myanmar in 2021, which ousted the elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi, triggered widespread armed resistance, severely destabilizing the country. The UNODC’s June 2023 report on synthetic drugs in East and Southeast Asia highlighted that the substantial trade in opium, methamphetamine, and other illegal narcotics showed no signs of decreasing.
Thailand’s Deputy Prime Minister and Interior Minister, Anutin Charnvirakul, informed reporters that illegal drugs used to be smuggled into Thailand’s northern and northeastern provinces but had shifted to western provinces like Kanchanaburi due to increased surveillance and security along the old routes—a point echoed earlier this year by the United Nations.
Police Seize 2 Million Meth Pills in Chiang Rai
Police in Chiang Rai seized a staggering 2 million methamphetamine pills last week, leading to the arrest of two individuals identified as Mr. Kriti, 44, and Mr. Phap, 56. The arrests were made at a checkpoint in the northern border province.
Chiang Rai police, acting on a tip about an impending drug transport via the Chiang Rai bypass, established checkpoints on Road No 131 in tambon Rop Wiang on December 6. On Saturday morning, their efforts proved successful as they stopped and inspected a Chevrolet pickup truck with Lampang license plates entering Chiang Rai. Kriti was at the wheel, with Phap in the passenger seat.
Upon inspection, officers discovered multiple black plastic bags in the rear seat, revealing ten woven sacks containing methamphetamine. Each sack was marked with Y1 and A, holding 200,000 pills each, totaling 2 million pills.
Both individuals were charged with the distribution of a Category 1 substance. They confessed to authorities that they had been recruited to transport drugs during the Loy Krathong holiday. Interestingly, they revealed that they had just loaded their vehicle 30 minutes prior and had only covered about 200 meters before being intercepted.
This incident follows a recent operation in Chiang Saen, Chiang Rai, where the Mekong River patrol team, along with paramilitary rangers and border patrol police, collaborated to apprehend drug smugglers, resulting in the seizure of approximately 3 million meth pills.
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