A dramatic increase in the number of arrests for smuggling narcotics across the Thai-Burma border has been recorded recently, alongside a sharp rise in border town youths using narcotics, according to the Thai authorities and a Burmese minority ceasefire group. 

A Sanghklaburi police officer told Kaowao that on average one trafficker was found and arrested daily, usually at either border checkpoints or in the Thai-Mon border village of Sanghklaburi, where they often hide out for a day or two before continuing further into Thailand.  To date all the arrested smugglers have been male and from different ethnic backgrounds including Thai, Karen, Burmese and Mon.  One of the biggest concerns the policeman cited was the age of those arrested – between 14 and 35. 

“Sadly we have even arrested and seized drugs from young men and women still in school uniform with drugs hidden in their underwear or under the seats of their motorbikes as they pass through checkpoints,” said the Thai officer.

A member of the Burmese ceasefire group, the New Mon State Party (NMSP) seized a narcotics smuggler at a checkpoint under NMSP control near Three Pagodas Pass (TPP), 18km from Sanghklaburi. The man was trying to enter Thailand from Burma with over 3000 pills of amphetamine.

According to the arrested trafficker, Moe Win (38), the dark pink pills stamped with WY+R were from Bago division. He was arrested with over 16 200-pill packets hidden beneath his jacket as he rode through the checkpoint on his motorbike late on the evening of Friday May 16th.  The Karen ethnic minority trader was suspected as linked with a Karen ceasefire groups who are active and have own control over some areas along the border.

At THB 150 per pill Sanghklaburi’s amphetamine prices are nearly double those in the neighboring Burma town of Three Pagodas Pass where a single pill is usually THB 90.  With Sanghklaburi a more lucrative market, dealers make the risky border crossing regularly. Once inside they can then travel further into Thailand to places like Mahachai, one of the biggest Burmese migrant workers’ town in Samut Sakhon provice near Bangkok, and where a single pill sells for at least THB200. 

“They (Burmese authorities of TPP) never used to administer any consequences for drug dealers when they arrested them with a small amount of pills, and they readily accepted bribes from dealers with larger quantities.  Now they have no control over a problem that is increasing every day,” a resident close with TPP authorities told Kaowao.

The Burmese ethnic minority logging town, Three Pagodas Pass has many unofficial and illegal border checkpoints across to Thailand controlled by the Burmese military regime as well as by the ceasefire groups, NMSP, Democratic Karen Buddhist Army (DKBA) and Karen Peace of Front (KPF), all of which have been based in the town for over ten years. The official Thai-Burma border checkpoint in the area has remained closed for over 14 months, since rebel fighting forced it’s closure March 2007.