Daily Times

Whisked over the remote mountains of Laos — one of the world’s last surviving communist countries — shipments are regularly slipping into Thailand, the region’s drug superhighway.

“It’s coming in from over there,” Thai navy captain Sumnuan Kamdee told AFP, gesturing across the wide Mekong, which bisects Thailand and Laos.

“Drugs have become a national threat.”

Once inside the kingdom, tonnes of highly addictive crystal meth, known as “ice”, and hundreds of millions of yaba pills — caffeine-laced methamphetamine tablets guzzled by everyone from labourers to ravers — are consumed or warehoused before being smuggled onwards.

A months-long Thai military-led crackdown in the northern jungles of the kingdom’s section of the notorious “Golden Triangle” has blocked the quickest drug route south.

But with big money to be made, the narco gangs have carved new routes west and east — through Laos and across the Mekong.

In the fading light, as the limestone karst scenery of Laos elbows into the night sky, black-clad Thai military rangers wait in mosquito-infested bushes for suspicious crossings.

“And they have scouts watching for checkpoints on this (Thai) side.”

– Cheap as a beer –

On smaller runs, Laos fishermen will cut their engines and drift close to the Thai bank before lobbing wax-covered parcels of 2-3,000 yaba pills towards the shore, where Thai couriers scamper out to claim them.

But bigger, multi-million-dollar shipments are becoming more frequent.

It was a fraction of the near three tonnes of “ice” seized by Thailand between just May 31 and June 4 — on top of nearly five million yaba tablets.

Despite the intense anti-drug operations, meth is still getting through to more lucrative overseas markets.

Australian border authorities announced a record 1.6 tonnes haul of ice in Melbourne last Friday — with an estimated street value of US $840 million — wrapped in packets of Chinese-branded tea and hidden in a shipment of stereo speakers shipped from Thailand.

At that price, losses are easily absorbed by the drug networks.

The tiny pink or green vanilla-scented yaba pills now go for as little as 30 baht (less than a dollar) in some border zones, drug officials told AFP — as little as a bottle of Thai beer.

A kilo of ice is down to around $11,000 in Bangkok — and just $4,800 in Laos.

“Meth is destroying lives, families and communities,” police major-general Pornchai Charoenwong, deputy commissioner of the Narcotics Suppression Bureau, told AFP.

– Spotlight on Laos –

Under pressure, Laos is co-operating with neighbouring law enforcement.

“But frankly Laos really needs to up their game when it comes to tackling organised crime, drug trafficking and border control,” said Jeremy Douglas of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC).

Meanwhile, meth continues to cascade across the Mekong region.

Vietnam has made record seizures this year, including 700 kilos of ice hidden in tea packets in Nghe An province, which borders Laos.

Cambodia is also reporting a spike in drug movements over its Laos border.

“Myanmar to Laos, then through Cambodia… this is now one of the main drug routes from the Golden Triangle,” Cambodia’s Deputy National Police Chief Mok Chito told AFP.

The falling drug prices are curdling a public health and crime crisis in local communities riddled with addiction and petty drug dealing.

In a remote Thai village near the Laos border, a recovering addict explained how his life slowly unravelled after being introduced to yaba aged 15.

“I lost money, friends and my health,” Nat — not his real name — told AFP.

“It took away ten years of my life. I am trying to get it back.”