More than 3 tonnes of drugs torched

Of them, 84,404 were forced into the programme, while 60,622 opted for it voluntarily and 12,986 were sentenced to do courses by courts. Most of them – 84 per cent – were addicted to ‘yaba’ and a third were aged from 18 and 24.
Cholanan was speaking at the 42nd official drugs-incineration ceremony in Ayutthaya’s Bang Pa-in Industrial Estate, in which 3,363 kilograms of illegal drugs worth over Bt10 billion were burnt. This includes 31 million yaba tablets worth Bt9.3 billion.
The minister said the volume of drugs being seized has been rising. In 2010, officials nabbed 4,300 kilograms in 42,803 cases, but this rose to 7,780kg in 76,739 cases in 2012. Eighty per cent of the drugs seized were methamphetamines (known locally as ‘yaba’).
Food and Drug Administration officials still have up to 28 tonnes of illicit drugs worth Bt83.74 billion in storage pending court rulings and a central committee’s approval for destruction, he said.