Police, Tatmadaw step up raids on meth labs near Thai border
A combined force of police officers and Tatmadaw troops are increasing inspections along a road in eastern Shan State where methamphetamine labs producing pills destined for Thailand's large market for the drug are believed to be located, a high-ranking
The inspections are taking place along Tachilek-Monghsat border road opposite Mae Sot, Thailand, said the officer who asked not to be named.
He said five drug-producing labs had been located so far, but the drug producers had fled before Tatmadaw troops arrived.
“We managed to find drug-production and related materials buried under the ground where drugs were being produced and that hundreds of thousands of stimulant tablets have been seized,” he said.
Drug production in the area is now a “small issue”, he said. “If effective inspections are carried out on this border road, the spread of drugs can be controlled,” he added.
Myanmar is known globally as a major source of heroin and methamphetamine, with Thailand being a major destination for both drugs. Opium is primarily cultivated in Shan, Kachin and Kayah states, while methamphetamine and other stimulants like ecstasy, are produced in labs in remote, border areas.
An intensification of inspections on routes used to smuggle narcotics is expected to reduce the trade, police say, adding that mot seizures of illegal drugs have taken place in Shan and Kachin states
Conflict between armed ethnic groups and the Tatmadaw is also occurring in these states.
A team comprising police from Monghsat and Tachilek, as well as Tatmadaw troops, has seized machines for producing WY-brand methamphetamine tablets as well precursor chemicals and about 630,000 bags for packaging the tablets for transport, officers said.
Reports in Thai and Cambodian media, however, say new routes are opening for transporting narcotics from Myanmar into Thailand along its borders with those two countries.
