Chalerm looks to cross-border help

Thailand might station military and police in Burma, Laos, Cambodia and China’s Yunnan province to help with suppressing the transborder drug trade, Deputy Prime Minister Chalerm Yoobamrung said yesterday.
The function of the military and police liaisons, which will be similar to military attaches at Thai missions overseas, will be to work on intelligence and crackdowns with host countries, he said after meeting with Burmese Ambassador U Ong Teng, who will be transferred back home soon.
Chalerm, who is in charge of fighting drugs, said he had asked the diplomat to help arrange for anti-narcotics officials to be assigned to work closely with Thai officials at all border checkpoints.
In his farewell message to Thai authorities, the envoy asked that Thai authorities not stand by while Thai labour and immigration officials extort Burmese migrant workers in Thailand. He also asked for a reduction in registration and identification fees for migrant Burmese to work legally in Thailand.
The Corrections Department’s offensive on convicts’ drug dealings continued with a surprise search of a prison in Surat Thani and a search of another in Uttaradit.
The dawn search in Surat Thani came up with a haul of contraband items and drugs, following the recent arrest of outsiders who threw mobile phones over the prison wall.
At Uttaradit prison, where more than 100 mobile phones and 9,900 amphetamine tablets were confiscated last year, the three-hour search turned up no drugs but various equipment capable of being used in jailbreaks.
Chief warden Banyat Aksorn-khonburi said a guard was dismissed and three are undergoing prosecution for their involvement in prison drug trafficking.
In Ubon Ratchathani, provincial authorities had caught lawyers smuggling items into prisons during consultations with their clients. To prevent further incidents, security cameras have been installed in visiting areas, a warden told a press launch of a local crackdown.
Recently 40 new cameras were added to the existing 30 units, |while plainclothes prison officials |are watching for any smuggling attempts and monitoring conversations and meetings between inmates and lawyers or relatives, said Chairoj Sinthuphutthipong, chief warden of the provincial prison.
A two-metre-high protective net has been raised on top of the seven-metre-high wall while 11 electric wires have been strung up in addition to the existing two, he said.