ENGLISH DEYEA NEWS

By SAI SILP | Thai forces shot and killed a suspected drug trafficker in Chiang Mai Province on Sunday, as authorities in Bangkok expressed growing concern about the introduction of new drugs into the country.

Chalerm Yoobamrung, Thailand’s interior minister, said in a press conference in Bangkok on Monday that the incident occurred in Chiang Mai’s Vianghaeng District after local police were tipped off about plans to transport drugs from the Thai-Burmese border.

“A trafficker was gunned down and another four fled from the scene,” said Chalerm, adding that police seized more than 300,000 amphetamine tablets in the raid.

Meanwhile, police in Nakorn Pathom Province, near Bangkok, arrested two Laotian nationals who were in possession of 80 kilograms of dried marijuana.

The shooting and arrests came amid official worries that Thailand was attracting unfamiliar types of narcotic drugs that were presenting new challenges for authorities.

Virote Sumyai, from the drug suppression department of the Food and Drug Administration, said on Sunday that ten new types of drugs have begun to appear in Bangkok’s night spots.

“The situation is getting more serious, because the new drugs have adapted further than the law can cover,” said Virote, according to a report in the Thai newspaper, Krungthep Turakij, on Tuesday.

The new drugs includes synthetic heroin, or methadone; crack cocaine; a substance made using secretions from the skin of cane toads; a chemical byproduct of methamphetamine production; and a mixture of cough syrup and kratom, a psychoactive plant found in Thailand’s far south.

The challenge for drug enforcement authorities is that some of these drugs are made from medicinal substances which are not in themselves illegal, but which have powerful effects when combined.

Pittaya Jinawat, deputy secretary general of Thailand’s Office of Narcotics Control Board, said that while the flow of drugs from northern Burma has slowed over the past year, more drugs have been coming into Thailand across its northeastern border with Laos and Cambodia.

Although drug abuse has been identified as a nationwide problem, it is especially critical in Bangkok and surrounding provinces, and well as in the three southernmost provinces, according to a report by Thailand’s Public Relations Department on Monday.